RELATION BETWEEN SLAVERY AND THE FUGITIVE SLAVE ACTS.
These Acts may be viewed as part of the system of Slavery, and therefore obnoxious to the judgment which Civilization is accumulating against this Barbarism; or they may be viewed as independent agencies. But it is difficult to consider them in the latter character alone; for if Slavery be the offence which it doubtless is, then must it infect all the agencies it employs. Especially at this moment, when, by common consent, Slavery is recognized as the origin and life of the Rebellion, must all its agencies be regarded with more than ordinary repugnance.
If in time of peace all Fugitive Slave Acts were offensive, as requiring what humanity and religion both condemn, they must at this moment be still more offensive, when Slavery, in whose behalf they were made, has risen in arms against the National Government. It is bad enough, at any time, to thrust an escaped slave back into bondage: it is absurd to thrust him back at a moment when Slavery is rallying all its forces for the conflict it has madly challenged. The crime of such a transaction is not diminished by its absurdity. A slave with courage and address to escape from his master has the qualities needed for a soldier of Freedom; but existing statutes require his arrest and sentence to bondage.
In annulling these statutes, Congress simply withdraws an irrational support from Slavery. It does nothing against Slavery, but merely refuses to do anything for it. In this respect the present proposition differs from all preceding measures of Abolition, as refusal to help an offender on the highway differs from an attempt to take his life.
And yet it cannot be doubted that the withdrawal of Congressional support must contribute effectively to the abolition of Slavery: not that, at the present moment, Congressional support is of any considerable value, but because its withdrawal would be an encouragement to that universal public opinion which must soon sweep this Barbarism from our country. It is one of the felicities of our present position, that by repealing all acts for the restitution of slaves we may hasten the happy day of Freedom and of Peace.
Regarding this question in association with the broader question of Universal Emancipation, we find that every sentiment or reason or argument for the latter pleads for the repeal of these obnoxious statutes, but that the difficulties sometimes supposed to beset Emancipation do not touch the proposed repeal, so that we might well insist upon the latter, even if we hesitated with regard to the former. The Committee find new motive to the recommendation they now make, when they see how important its adoption must be in securing the extinction of Slavery.
It is not enough to consider the proposed measure in its relations to Emancipation. Even if Congress be not ready to make an end of Slavery, it cannot hesitate to make an end of all Fugitive Slave Acts. Against the latter there are cumulative arguments of Constitutional Law and of duty, beyond any to be arrayed against Slavery itself. A man may even support Slavery, and yet reject the Fugitive Slave Acts.