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Show 288 DESPOTISM eral or state legislation, to give to a party to whom labor is really due, under the 1aws of a~y sta~e, the ri ght, in a ny and every oth~r ~tate, .t~ seize, wtt hout a ny process, and to carry ofl: hts. fugtttve whene_ver he can do so without any act of vwlence amounting to a breach of the peace. rrhis point was in perfect accordance with the opinion of Edmund Randolph, heretofore cited. It had been expressly ruled by the Supreme Courts of New York and Massachusetts in the cases of Glen v. Hodges, (9 Johnson, 67,) and of Commonwealth v. Grijjith, (2 Pickering, 11,) as well as by the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania in the caHe of Wf'i"'ht v. D eacon. And accordmg to the vtew set forth at the beginning of this sec~hm, such a ri&ht of seizure, without process, and without any spec1al Iegi:;;lative provision for it, must exist in all the states whose local laws, as is generally the case, concede a similar right of recaption wl~en~v~r th~ control or custody of the person of one md1v1dual 1s ve•ted, by the law, in another. But of course a ll such re~apt10ns are subject, as in all other cases of t?e e~erct~e of a similar power, to have their grounds 1nquued mto by the state courts. Yet though supported by such authorities, the rule of constitutional interpretation here adopted seems in direct contlict with a decision made by this same Supreme Court of the United States only the very year before, in a. case involv.ing. the efiect and force of a provision 111 the consbtutJOn of the state of Mississippi. 'fhat constitution contained the.following clause: "'rhe introduction of slavrs ~~~~.o thi• state as merchandise or for sale shall be prohtbJIed from and after the first day of May, 1833; provided the actual settler or settlers shall not be prohibited from purchasing slaves in any state in this "£!ni~n; and bringing thrm into .this state ~or his own Ind1v1dual use till 1845,"-whlch clause, 111 the case of Graves 4- al. v. Slaughter, (15 Wheaton, 449,) had been. set up as invalidating a note given for slaves brought mto Mississippi as merchandise, and sold there subsequent- IN AMERICA. 289 ly to May 1833. In that ca•e, for the protection of t he f;/~vc-traders, who had retained Clay and Wcb:ster as t~e ~r counsc·l, the co urt held that tlli::~ co nstitutional provJs Jon wa~ a mere injunction on the legislature a nd of no cfJcct t.ill first it had bt~t·n complied witl; by the enactn:Jent of a law for enforcing it. ]t i:::, h,owever, bu.t .JUStice to state, that th ree of t he judges, St.o.r~, McK11!lcy, and Baldwin, cli sscnted from this dccJsJUn, whi le a fourth, Daniel who now concurred with the majority, was not th~ n a member of the c~ urt. ,~,h e two forme~ I_Jad held, consistently enough With. ~he1r present op11110n, that the constitut ional provision w~s eOicacious in itself, a nd the contract t herefore. VOJd. Baldwin did not deny the right of a state e ntJrely to prohibi t t.he introduction of slaves as a. ~att~r of internal policy, but he regarded the proVISIOn In the constitution of Mississippi as a bare attempt to regulate the internal s lave-trade and to give to residents in the state adva ntages over' citizens o~ .other .states, and on that ground he held the proVI SIOn v01d, as confli ct ing with the excJusive right of Congress to regulate trade between t.he states. . Such had been the rule of constitutional in te rpretatwn !wid by the S upreme Court of t he United States Ill 1841. In 1842 the co nveni ence of slave.holding seemed to. reqUire a totally opposite decision, and, true to th e1r doctrine of beino- tied up by no rules t?e m~jority of the court n~w ran headlong with Stor.y 1nto the opposite extreme. Not only did they fwd 1~ ~he bare constitutional injunction, with re~Spect to fu g:1hves from labor, an indefeasible right of reca ptur~, mdependent of a ll special legislation state or natiO nal,-they allowed Story to put forth, in their n.amc, the extravagant statement that" the constitutional clause put• the righ t to the service and labor upon the same ground, and to tlte same extent, in every othrr state as in the state to which the slave escaped, and in which he was held to service or labor;" and that" any state law that interrupts, li1nits, delays, and postpones the right of the owner t.o the immediate 25 |