Footage of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers forcefully detaining undocumented immigrants on the streets or at workplaces – particularly in states that oppose such methods – and the determined resistance of protesters intent on defending those targeted, evoke another major crisis in American democracy: the one triggered by the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850. So too does the heart-wrenching fate of immigrants who have built their lives in the United States, only to be deported to countries they left decades earlier, often facing family separation.
The intention here is not to equate the plight of today’s undocumented immigrants with that of 19th-century fugitive slaves. Their legal status and the history of their presence in the US are distinct. Rather, the goal is to highlight the similarities between their experiences and to point out the resemblances between two defining crises in American democracy: the current crisis roiling the country and the one that set the stage for the Civil War in 1861. This comparison sheds light on the paradoxical role of the federal government, which, in the words of American author Toni Morrison, is “authorizing chaos in defense of order.” Indeed, from the earliest decades of the 19th century, fierce battles for freedom were waged in the US, even as the nation was bitterly divided over the issue of slavery.
Today, undocumented immigrants, terrified at the prospect of arrest and forced deportation, often do not leave their homes to avoid detection by ICE. Similarly, fugitive Black Americans in the 19th century, even in the North, lived in fear of being captured again. Escapes from slavery, which had occurred since colonial times, became more frequent after the US independence in 1776, as Northern states gradually abolished slavery. Enslaved people from the South could seek refuge in the North, but only within certain limits.
New operational tactics
In 1793, the first Fugitive Slave Act allowed slave owners to pursue and reclaim enslaved people even in states where slavery had been abolished. Local authorities were expected to assist, but over time, Northern states, such as Vermont, as well as others in New England, began to resist. They enacted personal liberty laws banning the detention of fugitives in state jails or protecting them through other means. Many fugitives settled in the North, finding work in major cities, becoming active in church life and buying homes.
You have 55.97% of this article left to read. The rest is for subscribers only.
