By this law every Northern man was obliged, when properly summoned, to turn out and help apprehend the runaway slave of a Southern man.

Northern marshals became slave-catchers, and Northern courts had to contribute to the support and protection of the institution.
This was a degradation which the North would not permit any longer than until they could get the power to expunge such laws from the statute books.

Prior to the time of these encroachments the great majority of the people of the North had no particular quarrel with slavery, so long as they were not forced to have it themselves.

But they were not willing to play the role of police for the South in the protection of this particular institution.
In the early days of the country, before we had railroads, telegraphs and steamboats--in a word, rapid transit of any sort--the States were each almost a separate nationality.

At that time the subject of slavery caused but little or no disturbance to the public mind.