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Card 9 / 13:
Why did many in the North resist the Fugitive Slave Act?
This federal law appeared to northerners to be further proof of a “Slave Power” conspiracy and elite slaveholders’ disproportionate influence over U.S. domestic policy. Northerners also resented being compelled to serve as de facto slave-catchers, as the law punished people not only for helping fugitive slaves, but also for failing to aid in efforts to return them. Finally, the law rankled many northerners for the hypocrisy that it exposed, given southerners’ arguments in favor of states’ rights and against the federal government’s meddling in their affairs.
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