isowns, still the Act is again radically
unconstitutional from its denial of Trial by Jury in a question of
personal liberty and a suit of common law. Since on the one side there
is a claim of property, and on the other of liberty, both property
and liberty are involved in the issue. To this claim on either side is
attached Trial by Jury.

To me, Sir, regarding this matter in the light of the Common Law and
in the blaze of free institutions, it has always seemed impossible to
arrive at any other conclusion. If the language of the Constitution were
open to doubt, which it is not, still all the presumptions of law,
all the leanings to Freedom, all the suggestions of justice, plead
angel-tongued for this right. Nobody doubts that Congress, if it
legislates on this matter, may allow a Trial by Jury. But if it may, so
overwhelming is the claim of justice, it MUST. Beyond this, however, the
question is determined by the precise letter of the Constitution.

Several expressions in the provision for the surrender of fugitives from
service show the essential character of the proceedings. In the first
place, the person must be, not merely charged, as in the case of
fugitives from justice, but actually held to service in the State which
he escaped. In the second place, he must "be delivered up on claim
of the party to whom such service or labor may be due." These two
facts--that he was held to service, and that his service was due to
his claimant--are directly placed in issue, and must be proved. Two
necessary incidents of the delivery may also be observed. First, it
is made in the State where the fugitive is found; and, secondly,
it restores to the claimant complete control over the person of the
fugitive. From these circumstances it is evident that the proceedings
cannot be regarded, in any just sense, as preliminary, or ancillary
to some future formal trial, but as complete in themselves, final and
conclusive.

These proceedings determine on the one side the question of property,
and on the other the sacred question of personal liberty in its most
transcendent form,--Liberty not merely for a day or a year, but for
life, and the Liberty of generations that shall come after, so long as
Slavery endures. To these questions the Constitution, by two specific
provisions, attaches Trial by Jury. One is the familiar clause, already
adduced: "No person shall be deprived of life, liberty, or property
without due process of law,"--that i