the
rescue of Mr. Burns are guilty of a misdemeanor; if they "evinced an
express liking" that he should be rescued by a miracle wrought by
Almighty God,--and some did express "approbation" of that
"means,"--they are indictable, guilty of a "misdemeanor;" "it need not
appear that the precise time, or place, or means advised, were used!"
If any colored woman during the wicked week--which was ten days
long--prayed that God would deliver Anthony, as it is said his angel
delivered Peter, or said "Amen" to such a prayer, she was "guilty of a
misdemeanor;" to be indicted as a "principal."

So every man in Boston who, on that bad Friday, stood in the streets
of Boston between Court Square and T Wharf, was "guilty of a
misdemeanor," liable to a fine of three hundred dollars, and to
jailing for twelve months. All who at Faneuil Hall stirred up the
minds of the people in opposition to the fugitive slave bill; all who
shouted, who clapped their hands at the words or the countenance of
their favorites, or who expressed "approbation" by a whisper of
"assent," are "guilty of a misdemeanor." The very women who stood for
four days at the street corners, and hissed the infamous Slave-hunters
and their coadjutors; they, too, ought to be punished by fine of three
hundred dollars and imprisonment for a year! Well, there were fifteen
thousand persons "assembled" "in the highway" of the city of Boston
that day opposed to kidnapping; half the newspapers in the country
towns of Massachusetts "evinced an express liking" for freedom, and
opposed the kidnapping; they are all "guilty of a misdemeanor;" they
are "Principals." Nay, the ministers all over the State, who preached
that kidnapping was a sin; those who read brave words out of the Old
Testament or the New; those who prayed that the victim might escape;
they, likewise, were "guilty of a misdemeanor," liable to be fined
three hundred dollars and jailed for twelve months.[194]

[Footnote 194: 2 Parker's Additional, 280.]

But where did Judge Curtis find his right to levy Ship-money, Tonnage,
and Poundage on the tongues of men; where did he find his "law?"
Surely not in the statute. When the bill was pending in 1790, suppose
his construction of the statute had been declared to Congress--who
would have voted for a law so monstrous? The statute lay in the
Law-book for nearly seventy years, and nobody ever applied it to a
case like this.

Gentlemen, I have shown you already how British judge