Sherman M. Booth Quotes
I rejoice that, in the first attempt of the slave-hunters to convert our jail into a slave-pen and our citizens into slave-catchers, they have signally failed, and that it has been decided by the spontaneous uprising and sovereign voice of the people, that no human being can be dragged into bondage from Milwaukee.
The Federal Fugitive Slave Act required all in free states to assist owners of escaped slaves to return them to their owners. In 1854 a Missouri slave owner tracked his escaped slave to Wisconsin and the Federal officials incarcerated the slave pending his return. A Wisconsin mob broke the slave out of jail and helped him escape to Canada. Booth was convicted under the Fugitive Slave Act for aiding the escape. Booth’s conviction was overturned by Wisconsin Supreme Court Judge Smith whose opinion overturned the Fugitive Slave Act on the grounds that it had usurped state’s rights. The Supreme Court overturned Smith’s ruling, but Booth was pardoned. See {587928}, {587927} & {587928}. State’s rights is a concept that we generally identify with Southern slave holding states to maintain slavery, but in this case, Wisconsin used the concept to fight slavery.
Sherman M. Booth, 1812-1904, Publisher & Editor of the Wisconsin Free Soil Democrat, Statement to the Judge at his trial for inciting a mob to free a fugitive slave being held for his owner to retrieve, 1854
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The Federal Fugitive Slave Act required all in free states to assist owners of escaped slaves to return them to their owners. In 1854 a Missouri slave owner tracked his escaped slave to Wisconsin and the Federal officials incarcerated the slave pending his return. A Wisconsin mob broke the slave out of jail and helped him escape to Canada. Sherman M. Booth, Publisher & Editor of the Wisconsin Free Soil Democrat was convicted under the Fugitive Slave Act for aiding the escape. Smith’s opinion overturned the Fugitive Slave Act on the grounds that it had usurped state’s rights. The Supreme Court overturned Smith’s ruling, but Booth was pardoned. See {587926} & {587928}. The more “dread calamity” was civil war which of course came a few years later.
Federal authorities had jailed Glover pending his return to his Missouri owner. A local Wisconsin judge issued an order for Glover’s release on the grounds that slavery was illegal in Wisconsin and he was entitled to freedom. The Federal authorities refused to release the escapee. The Wisconsin mob then stormed the jail and broke Glover out. Glover was helped to get to Canada and final freedom by the people of Wisconsin, but Booth was prosecuted and convicted under the Fugitive Slave Act. He was later pardoned. See {587921}.
Sherman Miller Booth was an abolitionist, editor and politician in Wisconsin, and was instrumental in forming the Liberty Party, the Free Soil Party and the Republican Party. He became known nationally after helping instigate a jailbreak for a runaway slave in violation of the Fugitive Slave Act.
