Fugitive Slave Act, First

Fugitive Slave Act, First (12 February 1793) This law allowed slaveowners, or their agents, to demand warrants from federal or state magistrates to return alleged runaways to their home state. Although slaves were not entitled to protection under the Bill of Rights, the law failed to guarantee rights under the Fifth and Sixth Amendments to free blacks wrongly arrested as slaves. Despite this fundamental denial of rights to black citizens, the Supreme Court upheld the law in Prigg v. Pennsylvania.