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thirty-three are Free States; in these, slavery has either been abolished or has never existed: the other fifteen are Slave-holding States. Moreover, as appears by the census of 1850, — in the Free States the population is thirteen millions and upwards, whereas the white population in the Slave States is but little more than six millions. Thus it appears that less than one-third of American citizens are slave-owners, or even dwellers in the States where slavery exists. Is it right, then, to stigmatize the whole nation for the doings or for the condition of a small minority? — to cast upon all Americans a reproach which, at worst, belongs to less than one-third of their number, and which even with those, as already shown, may be justly considered rather their misfortune than their fault, since it was imposed upon them by others?^[1]

But, to the citizens of the Free States, not only is the negative credit due, of being free from the

1. "Much denunciation has been uttered on the subject of the "Fugitive slave law" (as it is called), by persons who are probably ignorant of the real grounds on which that act was passed. The greatest reluctance was felt and expressed by many of the representatives from the Free States, to pass any Act by which fugitives should be returned to bondage, but there was no escaping from it but by the violation of their oath. In the original compact between the States, — called the "Constitution of the United States" (which every public officer is sworn faithfully to maintain), there is the following provision (Article in, Section 2): "No person held to service or labor in one State, under the laws thereof, escaping into another, shall, in consequence of any law or regulation therein, be discharged from such service or labor; but shall be delivered up on claim of the party to whom such service or labor may be due." Thus the law already existed; for the Constitution is the supreme law of the land. The Act, above referred to, was simply a law to carry into execution this provision of the Constitution.