If the argument of the attorney-general be sound, then the whole “privilege of the writ of habeas corpus,” under any corrupt law that any corrupt Congress may pass, will consist in the privilege of applying to a court for the writ, and being refused; or in suing out the writ, and having it quashed.
Mann warns that if the attorney-general's argument holds, the privilege of habeas corpus could be undermined by corrupt laws.
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A southern slave stands higher, politically, than a northern laborer, if the latter must vote as his employer dictates.
The liberty of voting includes all other liberties.
These are but specimens of what the Fugitive Slave law has already done, before the public mind has become familiarized with its brutalities, and while there is yet some sensibility to the claims of justice and mercy left among us.
But such largesses to slavery as kings could not afford to give, and the robbery of an entire race of all its rights,--yes, and with authority, too, to make us help commit the robbery,--these are “factitious and imaginary” causes of…
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