over and punish them. In New York, though Gerrit Smith and a local
clergyman with a few assistants rescued a fugitive from the officers of
the law and sent him to Canada, openly proclaiming and justifying the
act, no attempt was made to punish the offenders.

After a dozen years of intense and ever-increasing excitement, when
other causes of friction between North and South had apparently been
removed and good citizens in the two sections were rejoicing at
the prospect of an era of peace and harmony, public attention was
concentrated upon the one problem of conduct which would not admit of
peaceable legal adjustment. Abolitionists had always been stigmatized as
lawbreakers whose aim was the destruction of slavery in utter disregard
of the rights of the States. This charge was absolutely false; their
settled program involved full recognition of state and municipal control
over slavery. Yet after public attention had become fixed upon conduct
on the part of the abolitionists which was illegal, it was difficult to
escape the implication that their whole course was illegal. This was the
tragic significance of the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850.

CHAPTER IX. BOOKS AS ANTI-SLAVERY WEAPONS

Whittier offered up "thanks for the fugitive slave law; for it gave
occasion for 'Uncle Tom's Cabin.'" Mrs. Harriet Beecher Stowe had been
mistress of a station on the Underground Railroad at Cincinnati, the
storm-center of the West, and out of her experience she has transmitted
to the world a knowledge of the elemental and tragic human experiences
of the slaves which would otherwise have been restricted to a select
few. The mistress of a similar station in eastern Indiana, though she
held novel reading a deadly sin, said: "'Uncle Tom's Cabin' is not
a novel, it is a record of facts. I myself have listened to the same
stories." The reading public in all lands soon became sympathetic
participants in the labors of those who, in defiance of law, were
lending a hand to the aspirants for liberty. At the time of the
publication of the story in book form in March, 1852, America was being
profoundly stirred by the stories of fugitives who had escaped from
European despotism. Mrs. Stowe refers to these incidents in her
question: "When despairing Hungarian fugitives make their way, against
all the search-warrants and authorities of their lawful governments to
America, press and political cabinet ring with applause and welcome.
When despairing Afric