Fugitive Slave Act of 1793

The first Fugitive Slave Act authorized slave catchers to cross state lines, required local authorities to assist in recapturing escaped enslaved people, and imposed fines on anyone who harbored a fugitive or interfered with capture. It required no jury trial; an affidavit from an enslaver sufficed. The law made free Northern states complicit in slavery's enforcement and was used to re-enslave some free Black Northerners.