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Booth, William A., fl. 1861 Memorial to Congress, Adopted at a Meeting of Citizens at the Rooms of the Chamber of Commerce

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Gilder Lehrman Collection #: GLC08932 Author/Creator: Booth, William A., fl. 1861 Place Written: New York Type: Printed document Date: January 18, 1861 Pagination: 4 p. : Height: 25 cm, Width: 20 cm Order a Copy

Signed in print by William A. Booth as committee chair and twenty seven other New Yorkers. The memorial, printed a few months before the outbreak of the Civil War, was made in an effort to maintain peace. It appointed a committee that met on 26 January 1861 to make recommendations for "compromise" with the rebel states. That committee called for capitulation to the South on the issue of slavery. They proposed amendments to the Constitution limiting federal power over slavery and its extension into territories below the line of the Missouri Compromise. Also asserts that the Fugitive Slave law should be obeyed, that the proscription on the importation of slaves should be strictly enforced, and an act should be passed to punish inter-state/territory "marauding expeditions."

Booth, William A., fl. 1861

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