xt7pnv996d9b https://exploreuk.uky.edu/dips/xt7pnv996d9b/data/mets.xml Johnston, William, 1804-1892. 1846 books b92-158-29919269 English s.n., : [S.l. : Contact the Special Collections Research Center for information regarding rights and use of this collection. Slavery United States Kidnapping. Slaves United States Legal status, laws, etc. Speech of William Johnston, Esq. before the Franklin Circuit Court of Kentucky, April 10, 1846 text Speech of William Johnston, Esq. before the Franklin Circuit Court of Kentucky, April 10, 1846 1846 2002 true xt7pnv996d9b section xt7pnv996d9b

SPEECH OF WM. JOHNSTON, ESQ.,
BEFORE THE

FRANKLIN CIRCUIT COURT OF KENTUCKY.

PREFACE.
CANDIDATES for office frequently find it convenient to lay down -new
platforms suited to the current opinions of the day, and to declare their
present, though new, zeal in behalf of doctrines known to be popular.
It is the felicity of Judge Johnston, that his earlier, as well as his later,
productions may be safely trusted with his fellow citizens of the present
day, without note or comment. Before the great Proviso of Freedom had
taken a new name, and been spread upon the banner of party-while
Wilmot and Van Buren were cooperating with Southern politicians under
the lead of Mr. Polk-Judge Johnston, in the year 1846, in the capital of
Kentucky, fearlessly asserted the whole truth on this subject, earnestly
and without equivocation. The following is the speech which he made
on that occasion, as reported and published at the time.

Franklin Circuit Court, Kentucky, April 10, 1846, before tMe
IION. MASON BROWN, Circuit Judge.

The State of Ohio, v. Forbes and Armitage.
SLAVERY-KIDNAPPING-FUGITIVES FROM JUSTICE.

THuE facts proved upon the inquiry, were substantially these:
Jerry Finney was born a slave in the house of Hezekiah Brown, of a
colored woman named Rose. This woman and Jerry were held by Brown,
not in his own right, but as the property of his wife; Rose having be-
longed to a former husband by the name of Long, by whom, previous to
her marriage with Brown, she had eight or nine children, among others,
Thomas Long. In the last will and testament of Hezekiah Brown, he
loaned to his wife a number of articles of property, real and personal,
among other things, the boy Jerry, to be held during her natural life,
and, after her death, to go to her heirs. After the death of Brown, his
executors, Henry Brown and John D. Richardson, executed a paper
relinquishing to Mrs. Brown, who survived her husband, all claim on the
part of Brown's estate to the boy Jerry, and declaring that they knew
him to be her property, and part of her former husband's estate. Thomas

Long, one of Mrs. Brown's sons by ber former husband, purchased in his
lifetime the interests of all the other heirs, except three, and died, leaving
Bathsheba Long his widow, who administered upon his estate, and pur-
chased in her own right the remaining interests of the other heirs, except
the third of one share, which is outstanding. Mrs. Long has settled up,
and made distribution of all her husband's estate, except Jerry. One of
her children is still a minor.
Sixteen or seventeen years ago, Mrs. Brown, after her husband's death,
hired the boy Jerry to a gambler, by tbe name of Allgaier, who repre-
sented that he was going to work him on a farm in Woodford county,
Kentucky-with a stipulation on Allgaier's part, that he should not take
him out of the State.
Allgaier took Jerry to the State of Ohio, and kept him in his service
there for six months; when, learning the fact, Mrs. Long, who held the
remainder in Jerry, wrote Allgaier a letter, directed te him at Cincinnati,
requiring him to return Jerry immediately, and threatening to sue him if
he did not comply; upon which Allgaier returned him to his mistress,
Mrs. Brown, who was still living, now deceased. A few weeks after,
Jerry asked permission to return to his last place of residence for his
clothes, which his mistress gave him, and he went away and never returned
till he came back in custody of Forbes and Armitage. Mrs. Brown ad-
vertised him as a runaway slave, and offered a reward for his apprehen-
sion; and since then, knowing that he was in the State of Ohio, Mrs.
Long has given three different powers of attorney, at different times, to
different persons, to bring him back, but always failed. A short time
ago, she, Mrs. Long, executed regularly, according to law, a power of
attorney to Forbes, whom she at the time had never seen, to apprehend
and return Jerry to her, at Frankfort, Kentucky. It is admitted that the
prisoner at the bar is the same Forbes, and that the prisoner Armitage
acted, in the matter of Jerry's seizure, in conjunction with Forbes.

SPEECH OF MR. JOHNSTON.

May it please your Honor:
Without setting up any claim to modesty, I confess that I appear be-
fore you laboring under great embarrassment-such as I never before
felt. Not that any imflammatory excitement is felt against me personally,
for I know there is none, -not on account of any personal hazard to be
incurred by anything I am about to say -for I know I am safe, -but on
account of the novelty of my position, and the intrinsic importance of the

cause in which I appear, and the vast moment of the questions involved
in it. I come here not to quarrel with the domestic institutions of Ken-
tucky, nor to add to the excitement unhappily too great on both sides of
the water. I had rather contribute my efforts to promote peace and good
will between citizens of sister States, whose interests, rights, and feelings
are so nearly one; who have so often mingled the blood of consanguinity
in the bonds of peace; and the blood of patriotism on the field of bat-
tle, to secure the common blessings of union, liberty, and law to both. I
come here as the agent of the Executive of Ohio, with a legal requisition
for certain persons charged as fugitives from justice. It is my mission to
urge certain legal and international rights of the State which I represent;
and I feel that in this community I may safely discharge that duty as fully
and boldly, as if I stood in the halls of justice in the capital of my own
State.
Before I ever set my foot in this State, one of the first incidents which
called my attention to the character of its people, was the valedictory ad-
dress of a veteran Statesman, who, having finished his career, and re-
signed the cares of public life, had come up, as he said, to lay his bones in
Kentucky; because he knew that if they reposed in Kentucky earth, the
foot of a tyrant should never tread upon them. And I feel a strong and
abiding confidence, as I stand before you today, to debate these vexed and
exciting questions, that if there be any spot on earth where the ashes of
the dead or the rights of the living are secure, it is on the soil and in the
judicial tribunals of Kentucky.
Let me, then, as well as I may, overwhelmed by the kindness and the
cheers of this venerable assembly, approach the question involved.
And first: The statute of Kentucky, of 1820, under which this proceed-
ing is had, is at variance with the Constitution of the United States, and
the law of Congress of 1793, and void. The statute runs thus:
" SEC. 1. Be it enacted by the General Assembly of the Commonwealth
of Kentucky, That in all cases where any negro slave or slaves, have, or
may hereafter run away from his, her or their owners, and take protec-
tion in any of the United States, and the owner or owners of such slave,
by themselves, their agent, or any other person, with their approbation,
shall have removed, or shall, hereafter, remove any such slave, or slaves,
from any other State within the United States, into this Commonwealth,
and he, she, or they have been, or shall hereafter be indicted for the same,
in any one of the United States, and the Governor of said State shall de-
mand of the Governor of this State, the person, or persons, so indicted,
or who may, hereafter, be indicted, to be delivered to him agreeably to
the Constitution of the United States, and this State, it shall be the duty

The courthouse was crowded, and some five or six of the Ex-Governors of Kentucky, who
had taken their seats with the Judge on the bench, had responded to the preceding passage,
with long continued cheering.

of the Governor of this Commonwealth, upon such requisition being made
according to law, to issue his warrant to the Sheriff of the county where
such supposed fugitive may reside, if he has a known place of residence,
requiring him to take into custody such supposed fugitive, or fugitives,
from justice, as are named in such warrant and indictment, and bring
him, her, or them, before a Circuit Judge; and, if the Circuit Judge shall
be of opinion that the person, or persons, named in such warrant and in-
dictment, are the owner, or owners, of the slave, or slaves, named in such
indictment, or that he, she, or they, acted as the agent, or by the approba-
tion of the owner, or owners, of such slave, or slaves, it shall be the duty
of the Judge to discharge the person, or persons taken by virtue of said
warrant, out of custody.
SEc. 2. Be it further enacted, That if the Judge shall be of opinion
that the person, or persons, taken into custody by virtue of the Governor's
warrant, is not the owner, or owners, of the slave, or slaves, in the indict-
ment found against him, her, or them, in any one of the United States, for
stealing and conveying a slave, or slaves, which are not their own pro-
perty; or that he, she, or they, did not act as the agent, or by the appro-
bation of the owner, or owners, of such slave, or slaves, then it shall be
the duty of the Judge to remand such person, or persons, into custody
again, to be dealt with according to the laws now in force on that
subject."
Two questions of minor importance spring up under this act. First, are
these persons within the meaning and protection of the Statute, not being
indicted " by a jury of inquest, but only charged by the affidavits of
private citizens and, secondly, was the statute intended to protect any
but persons having a legal residence in Kentucky I suggest these
points to the consideration of the Court without argument, and proceed to
the main question: Is the law constitutional It will not be pretended
that the Legislature of Kentucky have not a right, that it is not their
duty, in some cases, to pass laws in aid of the Constitution, and for the
purpose of directing the mode in which its provisions shall be carried out.
The provision- of the Constitution, Art. IV. Sec. 2, is- "A person
charged, in any State, with treason, felony, or other crime, who shall flee
from justice, and be found in another State, shall, on the demand of the
executive authority of the State from which he fled, be delivered up, to
be removed to the State having jurisdiction of the crime."
It was well remarked by my brother Morehead, that the delivering up
of a fugitive from justice, under the constitution, was an executive act.
It is so, not because the constitution in so many words designates the ex-
ecutive as the only proper department, for it does not. The act of Con-
gress of 1793 imposes this duty on the executive. The mode then of
delivering up may, nay, ought to be directed by statute. But no statute
can be valid which thwarts the design of the constitution, or in any way
impedes the action or impairs the powers of the executive demanding, or
the executive delivering up, such fugitives. Thus, as by the act of 1815,

the statute may direct that an issue be made before a judge of the court
to ascertain the identity of the persons claimed as fugitives. But when
the statute, as in the act of 1820, takes the case out of the hands of the
executive, for the purpose of trying issues the result of which may defeat
the ends of the constitution, it is unconstitutional and void, and the court
has no jurisdiction under it.
The act of 1820 proposes to protect from the laws of the demanding
State, the owners of slaves, the agents of slave owners, and persons act-
ing by the approbation of slave owners; irrespective of the manner in
which they proceed in recovering the slave, or what infractions of law
they may have been guilty of in recovering him. Surely the constitution
never intended such a thing as this.
The clause in the constitution authorizing persons to whom labor or
service is due, to recover the persons held to such labor or service, does
not authorize the claimant to seize them sans ceremonie, wherever they
may be found -bind them hand and foot, and drag them away without
proof of ownership, and in the teeth of the laws of the State whither
they may have escaped. It says, "' They shall be delivered up on claim
of the party to whom such service or labor may be due." "Delivering
up," implies some act by authority, in the State to which the fugitive had
fled-not an act of physical force on the part of the claimant. And so
the Congress of 1793 understood the constitution. It is there provided,
"1 That, when a person, held to labor in any of the United States, or in
either of the territories on the northwest or south of the river Ohio, under
the laws thereof, shall escape into any other of the said states or territo-
ries, the person to whom such labor or services may be due, his agent or
attorney, is hereby empowered to seize or arrest such fugitive from labor,
and to take him or her before any judge of the circuit or district courts of
the United States, residing or being within the state, or before any magis-
trate of a county, city, or town corporate wherein such seizure or arrest
shall be made; and, upon proof to the satisfaction of such judge or
magistrate, either by oral testimony or affidavit, taken before and certified
by a magistrate of any such state or territory, that the person so seized
or arrested doth, under the laws of the state or territory from which he
or she fled, owe service or labor to the person claiming him or her, it
shall be the duty of such judge or magistrate to give a certificate thereof
to such claimant, his agent or attorney, which shall be sufficient warrant
for removing the said fugitive from labor to the state or territory to which
he or she fled."
Clearly this act contemplates a judicial examination as to the right of
the claimant. It contemplates no other mode of reclaiming, and, as this
act was passed in aid of the constitution, by a congress, composed to a
great extent of the same men, who but five years before had framed the

constitution; it may well be received as a fair exponent of that instru-
ment. But whatever protection the owner of the escaping slave may take
underthe constitution, without such judicial examination as to the owner-
ship, clearly the agent can take none. Agents, in such cases, are not
known to the constitution, nor to the ordinance of 1787. The statute of
1793 is the first enactment in which agents are known; and that act pro-
vides for such examination.
We in Ohio think such examination indispensable to the cause of jus-
tice and humanity. We see nothing but endless confusion, injustice, and
oppression growing out of the right to drag men, women, and children
from their homes without such examination. We see encouragement
given to a horde of pirates who infest the waters of the Ohio on both its
banks, and make mancatching a trade.
I do not say these wretches are Kentuckians. They are to be found on
both sides of the water, and do not deserve a name or local habitation on
either. They are the enemies of the human race: without sympathy for
anybody, and entitled to sympathy from nobody: men who will steal
your slave from you today, and sell him to you tomorrow.
There is a distinguished character now in the Ohio penitentiary, who
made a fortune by first persuading slaves to run away from their masters,
quartering them on credulous black people (who, on account of their
color, could not be witnesses against him), till a reward should be offered,
and then conveying them back again for the reward. There are unfortu-
nately others out of the penitentiary who follow the same calling, until, if
you were on the southern line of Ohio, you would almost imagine you
were on the slave coast of Africa.
About eight years ago a free colored woman, born in Ohio, and resi-
ding in Brown county, in the absence of her husband, was seized, and,
without examination, or any forms of law whatever, carried into Mason
county, Kentucky, and lodged in jail, under pretense that she was the
slave of Arthur Fox, high-sheriff of Mason county. Mr. Fox disclaimed
ownership in her; and then she was retained in prison under pretense
that she was the slave of Mrs. Johns, of New Orleans. Mrs. Johns also
disclaimed her; and, then being in prison as a runaway slave, she was
subject to be sold at the end of fourteen months for jail fees. She was
only set at large by executive interposition. I mention this case, not
because it is a singular one, but because I happen to be familiar with it,
and because it is a matter of record in both States. Cases far more
aggravated, of which no record exists, have often occurred. Men be-
lieved to be freemen, have been knocked down with a "colt" in the
streets, in the night season, dragged into boats, and carried-God only
knows where.
To prevent such outrages, the Legislature of Ohio have enacted two

statutes against kidnapping. The one against seizing and carrying away
free persons: the other against seizing and carrying away any person
whatever, without a hearing. These statutes of Ohio in nowise contra-
vene the Constitution of the United States or the act of 1793, nor embar-
rass the owners of fugitive slaves in recovering their property. Ought
not these laws to be respected
Forbes and Armitage stand charged by affidavit under both these stat-
utes. We say Jerry was, by operation of law, a free man, and that in
seizing and carrying him forcibly away, they were guilty of kidnapping.
The act was perpetrated in Ohio, by citizens of Ohio, and the tribunals
of Ohio alone have jurisdiction of the matter. They alone have a right
to inquire whether, under the laws of Ohio, such a state of facts exists,
as to bring these men within the law against kidnapping.
Again: we say that even if Jerry was a slave, Forbes and Armitage
had no right to carry him away without a fair hearing under the act of
congress of 1793; and that in so doing they were guilty of kidnapping.
And the act being perpetrated in Ohio, we claim for the Ohio tribunals
the sole right to try the question, whether they did thus seize and carry
him away without trial, or upon a mock trial, or in any way in violation
of the laws of Ohio.
Is this claiming too much on the part of a sister in the glorious confed-
eracy Are not the rights and claims of a sister State to be respected in
a case like this Yet this act of 1820 steps in, as I insist, in violation of
the Constitution and Laws of the United States, and takes the case out of
the hands of the executive and transfers it to the Judiciary, to try ques-
tions which belong to the tribunals of Ohio alone. The executive obeys
implicitly the statute of 1820, and it is for this court to determine, if your
Honor should be satisfied that the statute is void, whether it will take
jurisdiction of the matter; or simply try the question of identity under
the act of 1815.
If, however, it should be held that the statute of 1820 is valid, then
three questions of fact will arise.
1. Is Jerry a slave
2. Who is his owner
3. Did Forbes and Armitage act as the agents or with the approbation
of the owner
Upon the second question I do not propose to raise a doubt; for, if
Jerry be a slave at all, it may be conceded that Mrs. Long is the owner:
for, either in her own right, or as the executrix of her deceased husband,
she represents twenty-six twenty-sevenths of him; so that if he be the
property of anybody, he is the property of Mrs. Long.
The third point may be conceded, also, so far as Forbes is concerned;
because it is in evidence that he acted under a power of attorney, regu-

larly executed by Mrs. Long. But there was now power of attorney
authorizing Armitage to act in the premises; nor is there any proof of
erpress approbation of his conduct on the part of Mrs. Long; nor any
other approbation, except what she may have bestowed on him after he
arrived at Frankfort, with Jerry in his custody. If approbation ex post
facto, be contemplated by the act of 1820, I have not another word to say
on this point. But I believe the statute means no such thing.
But the first is the leading and controlling question. Was Jerry a slave
at the time Forbes and Armitage seized him at Columbus Because, if
he were not a slave, neither Mrs. Long nor any one else could be his
owner; and all authority to act, based upon such ownership, falls to the
ground; and all acts under such nugatory authority, are without the
protection of the act.
This question, whether we will or not, leads to discussion of the
institution of slavery, as it has existed, and now exists in the United
States.
And first: Slavery is not recognized by the law of nature. This broad
self-evident truth is laid down in the Declaration of Independence,-
" that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator
with certain inalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the
pursuit of happiness." The great men who put forth this declaration did
not mean to say all men, except negroes, are created equal, and endowed
by their Creator with the inalienable right of liberty. Nor did they mean
by this declaration to annul existing institutions at variance with this
great self-evident truth,-as slavery undoubtedly is,-but they meant
then, and for all future time-for themselves and their posterity-to set
up this great, self-evident moral truth, as the standard by which all law,
and all civilization, should thereafter be tried; not to unravel an evil
already too intimately interwoven with the warp of society to be removed
without destroying its texture; but in the name of their country, whose
independence they sought to establish, and in the name of the Creator,
who bestowed these "inalienable rights," to protest against its future
progress.
This doctrine is in strict accordance with the original charter given by
God to our great ancestor, before sin or oppression had marred the beauty
and glory of his new creation. With the archetypes of all that was
beautiful and good before his mighty eye, "s God said, Let us make man
in our OWN IMAGE, after our likeness; and let them have dominion over
the fish of the sea, and over the fowls of the air, and over the cattle, and
over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the
earth. So God created man IN HIs OWN IMAGE; in the image of God
created he him; male and female created he them." As they stood thus
before the bridal altar, glowing in the charms of youthful love, with this

immense dowry before them, he pronounced upon them his parental bene-
diction, and delivered them the charter of their future estate: " And God
blessed them, and said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish
the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and
over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the
earth."
All that was not conveyed to man by this charter, the Grantor reserved
to himself. And that there might be no misunderstanding, either as to
the property granted, or names of the creatures included in the grant, he
gave him "I livery of seisin "-brought the mighty menagerie " to Adam,
to see what he would call them; and whatsoever Adam called every
living creature, that was the name thereof." As if God had said to man,
Catch that bounding steed, and put thy brand on his crest, and thy capa-
rison on his back, and make him bear thee whither thou shalt list.
Seize that powerful ox, and, putting thy yoke on his neck, compel him to
plow the soil. Shear that sheep, and clothe thyself with his fleecy
spoils. Snatch down the eagle from the cloud, and draw up leviathan
from the deep. Make all living creatures in the heavens above, in the
earth beneath, and in the waters under the earth, thy slaves; for they are
thine: but as for thee, and thy posterity by this beautiful bride, I have
stamped my own image upon you. YE ARE MINE ! Thus stood the meum
and tuum of the pristine world.
It is not pretended that the divine law of property, thus laid down, has
been always respected; or that slavery has not existed since a very early
period of history. Alas! who can look around him on the wrongs and
oppressions which wring the hearts of innocent millions without, or feel
the workings of ten thousand bitter pangs within, without acknowledging
that society has been sadly bruised and disjointed by the fall of man!
The first man that was born of woman, murdered the second; and thus
on, depravity, disorder, and oppression spread over the whole inhabited
earth. We see wars arise, and prisoners of war sold into slavery; nay,
whole nations carried away captive, and sold into bondage as a punish-
ment for their crimes, the nations thus punishing them frequently not less
criminal than themselves. We see depravity and wickedness, by Divine
permission, working out their own penalty and their own cure: but this
does not alter the Divine law. Still, property in man is contrary to the
law of nature. It exists, and is tolerated, in society, like some hereditary
disease; not as a part of man's original constitution, nor as his constitution
ought to be, but superinduced by remote causes at first, and now too
deeply fixed to be amputated or rooted out, without inconvenience, pain,
or loss of life. It was with reference to this great principle, that, although
slavery existed in some form or other, as a local institution in almost all
nations, and in Rome herself, it was one of the laws of the twelve tables
1

of Rome, that whenever there was a question between liberty and slavery,
the presumption should be on the side of liberty.
But again: Property in human beings is not only contrary to the law
of nature, but is contrary to the law of nations. There is no existing
obligation, moral, legal, or international, on the part of one State, to
deliver up fugitive slaves from another State. I know that a dictum from
the court, in the Amistad case, has been often referred to, to establish
a different rule, but that dictum is clearly not to the point. In that case,
the captive negroes were claimed, not upon any principle of international
law, but under the existing compact of 1795, between Spain and the
United States, for the mutual delivery of property in certain cases. The
case did not require a decision under the treaty, because the negroes in
controversy never had been lawfully slaves.
I say it is contrary to the law of nations, not because it is so written in
the black-letter books, but because, for a quarter of a century, the traffic
in slaves has been condemned by all the civilized nations of Europe and
America. Because the ministers of the principal European powers, in the
Congress of Vienna, in 1815, solemnly declared, in the face of Europe
and the world, "that the African slave trade had been regarded by just
and enlightened men in all ages, as repugnant to the principles of humanity
and universal morality, and that the public voice of all civilized countries
demanded that it should be suppressed; and that the universal abolition
of it was conformable to the spirit of the age and the generous principles
of the allied powers." Because, as early as 1821, there was not a flag of
any European States, which could legally cover this traffic, to the north
of the Equator. Because, by the Act of Congress of 1820, and by the
Act of the British Parliament of 1824, it is declared to be piracy, and
punishable with death.
It will be asked, how these acts can affect slavery as a domestic insti-
tution I answer, that they in no wise affect it, so long as it is domestic,
and stays at home. But they stamp upon it the character of a domestic,
a local institution. They forbid it to travel on the high seas; and the
same principle of law, adjudged by the judicial tribunals of the several
States, forbids it to travel by land.
Slavery is, then, strictly local. About this there can be but one opinion
among those who have examined the subject. In most of the British
Colonies, till recently, slavery has existed from time immemorial. We
are today indebted to Great Britain for the institution among us. It was
one of the counts on which Mr. Jefferson, in his original draft of the
Declaration of Independence, indicted the British King, that "he had
waged cruel war against human nature itself, violating its most sacred

15 Peters' R., 518.

rights of life and liberty, in the persons of a distant people who never
offended him-captivating and carrying them into slavery in another
hemisphere, or to incur miserable death in their transportation thither.
This piratical warfare, the opprobrium of infidel powers, is the warfare of
the Christian King of Great Britain. Determined to keep open a market
where MEN should be bought and sold, he had prostituted his negative
for suppressing every legislative attempt to prohibit or to restrain this
execrable commerce." Yet, though slavery has been thus tolerated as
a local institution in the provinces of Great Britain, it has been justly the
boast of every Englishman, in the eloquent language of Curran, " that the
spirit of the British law makes liberty commensurate with, and inseparable
from, the British soil;" that it "proclaims, even to the stranger and
sojourner, the moment he sets his foot upon British earth, that the ground
on which he treads is holy, and consecrated by the genius of UNIVERSAL
EMANCIPATION! No matter in what language his doom may have been
pronounced; no matter what complexion incompatible with freedom; an
Indian or an African sun may have burnt upon him; no matter in what
disastrous battle his liberty may have been cloven down; no matter with
what solemnities he may have been devoted upon the altar of slavery;
the first moment he touches the sacred soil of Britain, the altar and the
god sink together in the dust; his soul walks abroad in her own majesty;
his body swells beyond the measure of his chains, that burst from around
him, and he stands redeemed, regenerated, and disenthralled, by the
irresistible genius of UNIVERSAL EMANCIPATION."
Such, too, is the common law of France. Property in human beings is
strictly local, and cannot exist for a moment, after the slave passes the
territorial limits into a State where slavery is not tolerated. And this
principle of law in France is clearly recognized by the courts of Louisi-
ana, where this peculiar institution is far dearer to the people than it is to
the people of Kentucky. In the case of Maria Louisa v. Jariat and
others,t the defendants had carried a colored girl, admitted on all hands
to have been a slave in Louisiana, into France, where slavery is not tol-
erated, and brought her back into Louisiana as a slave,, Justice Matthews
holds the following language: " The question is, whether the fact of her
having been taken to that kingdom by her owners, where slavery or invol-
untary servitude is not tolerated, operated on the condition of the slave
so as to produce an immediate emancipation. That such is the benign
and liberal effect of the laws and customs of that State, is proven by two
witnesses of unimpeachable credibility. This fact was submitted to the
consideration of the jury who tried the cause under the charge of the
judge, which we consider to be correct, and was found in favor of the

Jefferson's Works, Vol. IV.

t 8 Louiisiana Rep. 475.

party whose liberty is claimed. Being free for one moment in France, it
was not in the power of her former owner to reduce her again to slavery."
This principle has been held in our own country, in every instance
where the nature of the case made it necessary or proper for a court to
express an opinion. Without multiplying cases to prove a position that
will hardly be doubted, in the case of Jonses v. Vanzandt, Justice
McLean says: "Slavery is local in its character. It depends on the mu-
nicipal law of the State where it is established. And if a person held in
slavery, go beyo