Ohio History Journal

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FUGITIVE SLAVE CASES IN OHIO PRIOR TO 1850

FUGITIVE SLAVE CASES IN OHIO PRIOR TO 1850

 

By LEO ALILUNAS

 

Background of the Fugitive Slave Question

Before the subject of fugitive slave cases in Ohio prior to

the passage of the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 can be developed,

it is necessary to consider a few aspects of the antislavery move-

ment in Ohio. A number of questions arise. What was the

antislavery sentiment of the people of Ohio before 1850? What

was the legislative policy of the State legislature on fugitive

slaves? What was the nature of the Underground Railroad move-

ment in Ohio, an agency for assisting fugitives to escape from

the slave system of the South? All these questions must receive

some response before analysis can be made of fugitive slave

litigation in Ohio resultant of the Fugitive Slave Act of 1793,

and of Ohio's fugitive slave legislation before 1850.

The composition of Ohio's population reflected its attitude

on slavery. In the Western Reserve were settlers from the various

New England states, New York, and northern Pennsylvania. In

east central Ohio settlers were from middle and western Penn-

sylvania, including Moravians and "Pennsylvania Dutch."   In

Marietta and in the Muskingum Valley the settlers came from

Massachusetts. In southern Ohio settlers came from the states

where slavery had existed at the time Ohio became a state, in-

cluding such states as Virginia, Kentucky, Tennessee, Maryland

and North Carolina.1

No doubt some antislavery sentiment developed in Ohio

before 1830, but its popular expression certainly was not aboli-

tionism.  In her research, Alice Dana Adams cited that only

four antislavery societies existed in 1827 in the State. Lundy

had formed a society at St. Clairsville in 1815. Another was

1 William Fox Cochran, "Western Reserve and Fugitive Slave Law," Western

Reserve Historical Society, Publications (Cleveland, O.), no. 101 (1920), 54.

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