In his last annual message to congress, on Dec 3, 1860, President Buchanan blaimed the tension on three things: the eexclusion of slavery from the territories; the "efforts of different states to defeat the Fugitive Slave Law"; and (chiefly) the "incessant and violent agititation of the slavery question throughout the North for the last quarter century". And, "The validity of [the Fugitive Slave Law] has been established over and over again by the Supreme Court with perfect unanimity". And, "Let us trust that the state legislatures will repeal their unconsitutional and obnoxious enactments". Apparently, President Buchanan believed there was more than one northern state government in defiance of the Fugitive Slave Law.
In the same address Buchanan also stated, "The antecedents of the President-elect have been sufficient to justify the fears of the South that he will attempt to invade their constitutional rights". And, "The stern duty of administering the vast and complicated concerns of this government affords in itself a guarantee that [the President] will not attempt any violation of a clear constitutional right.
To relieve the tensions, Buchanan recommended an "explanatory" amendment to the constitution, which included, "An express recognition of the right of property in slaves in the states where it now exists or may hereafter exist," and, "a declaration that all state laws imparing or defeating this right (e.g., the Fugitive Slave Law) are violations of the Constitution and consequently null and void.
Therefore, your statement that the northern states did enforce the fugitive slave law has questionable accuracy.
My people were some of those brave souls, who stood up to federal and sometimes state authority for the cause of charity, justice and human liberty.
God bless them, but they would have been more honorable if they had labored toward acts that would not have led to deaths of more than 600,000 American and the burdening of future generations with a laborious, wasteful, tyrannical government.
the underground railroad conductors were FEW & BRAVE;they never numbered over about 10,000 people, according to Professor Walter Williams.
the vast majority of whites in the USA cared not one damn about the plight of the slaves.they should have;they did NOT.
almost nobody was willing to fight a skirmish over slavery;NOBODY was willing to fight a long & costly war over the dying "peculiar institution", despite the current self-serving comments of the revisionists out of the most extreme leftist wing of northeastern academia.
TWBTS, for the southerners was about gaining LIBERTY. for the great mass of northern elitists it was about assuring the permanent subserviant status of the southland.
free dixie,sw