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Show 280 DESPOTJS!'t was delivered by William Tilghman, the chief justice. It is quite •hort, and the follow111g par.agraph embraces the most essential part of it. "It plam1y appears from the whole scope ami tenor of the constitution and act of Congress, that the fugiti.ve w::ts. to be delivered up on a summary proceedtng, Without the delay of a formal trial in a court of common law. But if he had really a right to freedom, that right was not impairC'd by that proceeding; he was placed just in 1hc situatiou in which he stood before he fled, and might prosecute the right in the state to which he bPlonged." Here we see the origin of Mr. Wrbster's idea of extradition, an idea involving a prejudgment of the case iu two of its most t>ssent.ial points; wholly cutting off from his most obvious rights every person certified as a fugitive, but not such in reality; and every person actually a fugitive, but certified as owing service to a claimant having no legal title to such service. VVhat a heartlese:, insolent mockery to tell a native citizen of Pennsylvania, about to be transferred to South Carolina on a certificate, purchased perhaps by a bribe of five dollarsfor it is but rea,onable to suppose that some state magistrates may be bought at the average price established by the act of 1850 for United States commis~ ioners ;-what a mockery to tell such a person, about to be placed in a pestiferous South Carolina rice swamp, with an iron chain and ball of fifty -pound•' weight attached to his leg, and an iron collar with four prongs to it about his neck, that his right to freedom will not be impaired by this proceeding; that he is placed in the same situation in which he stood before the certificate was granted, and that he can prosecute his right in the state to w.hich he b~longs! Such is the enormous abtmrd1ty 1nvolved lll. th1s opinion of 'rilghman's, and in that of every Judge and lawyer by whom it has been followed, all ~rO\~'· in()' out of the gratuitous assun~ption, contained ai~o Ill th~ very phraseology of Mr. Webster's draft of a biU, that every person claimed, or at least every person certi- IN A!HF.RIOA. 281 fied, must be a fugitive, and a fugiUve owing labor ~o ~he person who cla.im~ him. But beside.s thi!'l pre. JU~Iome!1t. of the case 10 1ts most essential particulara, th1~ op.m~on .and all its echoes totally ov~rlook the pla.lll dn;tu~ctwn between cases where the right of the ~la1mant . IS confessed, or not contested,- as, for mstanee, 10 the case of tenants holding over, in which casr.s alone summary proceedings for the enforcement of ~Jgh.ts. are evt-r allowcd,-and contested cases, in . wh1ch Jt JS the undoubted common law riaht of every party to h~ve a thorough trial, both as to facts and law j e~pPc.Ially ?efore so serious a step is taken as the debvermg hnn up as a chattel into the absolute power of anoth~r. So far from infrin()'ing that ricrht the F~deral constituti?n. has taken c;rc speciallY t~ guard It; and, surely, It IS o.ne from which no party, however humble or helpless, IS to be ousted by any im· plication or construction 1 nor, indeed, by any thing short . of the most express and positive provi::;ion in f('rms. Chief J ostice Tilghman was a lawyer of moderate tc~per and dec~nt abilitie:.;, (and the same description w1ll apply to Ins colleagues), belonging to that very larg~ class of JUns.t.s, to make one of which rcqoires notlung bu~ an ord1nary share of judgment, diligence, and l'Xpenence,-a kmd of men sufl-iciently well adapted to the ordinary routine of the bench but pretty certain to make some egregious blunder th~ mo· ment they attempt to •tep beyond it. A decided Federalist~ one of John Adams's midnight judges, Tilgh· man had been ou•ted from that •eat by the repeal of the act under which he held office, but shortly after had b~cn ra1sed to the chief-justic~.ship of Pcnn:;ylvania by Governor 1\'Ic~{can, at a tHne when that political gamester, having quarrelled with the more radical Dem.ocrats to whom he was indebted for his original ele.ct10n, had found it necessary lo sus1ain himself in ofl1cc by courting the aid of the Federalists. 'l'ii(Yhman and his colleagues probably hoped that so ~erem~ tory a decision might hdp to quiet the risina excttement in Pennsylvania on the subject of th~ 24· |