up courage to say just what I have asserted to be his decision; that there was no law in England affording the master control over his slave; and that therefore the master’s putting him on board of a vessel in irons, being unsupported by authority derived from English law, and the colonial law not being in force in England, he would discharge the slave from custody on habeas corpus, and leave the master to his remedy as best he could find one.

Mr. Fessenden.  Decided so unwillingly.

Mr. Benjamin.  The gentleman is right—­very unwillingly.  He was driven to the decision by the paramount power which is now perverting the principles, and obscuring the judgment of the people of the North; and of which I must say there is no more striking example to be found than its effect on the clear and logical intellect of my friend from Maine.

Mr. President, I make these charges in relation to that judgment, because in them I am supported by an intellect greater than Mansfield’s; by a judge of resplendent genius and consummate learning; one who, in all questions of international law, on all subjects not dependent upon the peculiar municipal technical common law of England, has won for himself the proudest name in the annals of her jurisprudence—­the gentleman knows well that I refer to Lord Stowell.  As late as 1827, twenty years after Great Britain had abolished the slave trade, six years before she was brought to the point of confiscating the property of her colonies which she had forced them to buy, a case was brought before that celebrated judge; a case known to all lawyers by the name of the slave Grace.  It was pretended in the argument that the slave Grace was free, because she had been carried to England, and it was said, under the authority of Lord Mansfield’s decision in the Sommersett case, that, having once breathed English air, she was free; that the atmosphere of that favored kingdom was too pure to be breathed by a slave.  Lord Stowell, in answering that legal argument, said that after painful and laborious research into historical records, he did not find anything touching the peculiar fitness of the English atmosphere for respiration during the ten centuries that slaves had lived in England.

* * * * *

After that decision had been rendered, Lord Stowell, who was at that time in correspondence with Judge Story, sent him a copy of it, and wrote to him upon the subject of his judgment.  No man will doubt the anti-slavery feelings and proclivities of Judge Story.  He was asked to take the decision into consideration and give his opinion about it.  Here is his answer: 

“I have read, with great attention, your judgment in the slave case.  Upon the fullest consideration which I have been able to give the subject, I entirely concur in your views.  If I had been called upon to pronounce a judgment in a like case, I should have certainly arrived at the same result.”