Fugitive Slave Act
After he was said to be the first slave to be a priest in the 19th century, Jones took part of the first group of African Americans to petition the U.S. Congress. Their petition related to the 1793 Fugitive Slave Act which was criticized for encouraging cruelty and brutality, and noted the danger which free blacks risked of being kidnapped and sold into slavery. While U.S. Representative George Thatcher of Massachusetts responded with the desire to amend the Fugitive Slave Act, other representatives' resistance to changing the law forced his proposal to fail.
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Famous quotes containing the words fugitive slave, fugitive, slave and/or act:
“It is by a mathematical point only that we are wise, as the sailor or the fugitive slave keeps the polestar in his eye; but that is sufficient guidance for all our life. We may not arrive at our port within a calculable period, but we would preserve the true course.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“It is by a mathematical point only that we are wise, as the sailor or the fugitive slave keeps the polestar in his eye; but that is sufficient guidance for all our life. We may not arrive at our port within a calculable period, but we would preserve the true course.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“The moral equalizes all; enriches, empowers all. It is the coin which buys all, and which all find in their pocket. Under the whip of the driver, the slave shall feel his equality with saints and heroes.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“When sins are dear to us we are too prone to slide into them again. The act of repentance itself is often sweetened with the thought that it clears our account for a repetition of the same sin.”
—Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826)