It was exactly the opposite and frankly Rusbucket, I have lost a lot of respect for you with that post. You and I have had a lot of conversation over the years and I never saw you as a stand waite or central va. type crazy poster. Perhaps, I was mistaken.
For anyone who would care to look at the proposal Lincoln put before the Congress in 1849, Here's a link.
I’m glad you brought that out. I read the link too and pondered over if I was mis-reading it or...?
I linked to the whole bill including its objective to free the slaves in the District of Columbia and particularly noted its Section 5 which was a fugitive slave law.
Section 5 That the municipal authorities of Washington and Georgetown, within their respective jurisdictional limits, are hereby empowered and required to provide active and efficient means to arrest, and deliver up to their owners, all fugitive slaves escaping into said District--
Lincoln's bill required municipal authorities to provide the means to arrest and return fugitive slaves to their owners. Is that not a fugitive slave law?
From the 1850 Fugitive Slave Act (my emphasis and underline below):
when a person held to service or labor in any State or Territory of the United States, has heretofore or shall hereafter escape into another State or Territory of the United States, the person or persons to whom such service or labor may be due, or his, her, or their agent or attorney, duly authorized, by power of attorney, in writing, acknowledged and certified under the seal of some legal officer or court of the State or Territory in which the same may be executed, may pursue and reclaim such fugitive person, either by procuring a warrant from some one of the courts, judges, or commissioners aforesaid, of the proper circuit, district, or county, for the apprehension of such fugitive from service or labor, or by seizing and arresting such fugitive, where the same can be done without process, and by taking, or causing such person to be taken, forthwith before such court, judge, or commissioner, whose duty it shall be to hear and determine the case of such claimant in a summary manner; and upon satisfactory proof being made, by deposition or affidavit, in writing, to be taken and certified by such court, judge, or commissioner, or by other satisfactory testimony, duly taken and certified by some court, magistrate, justice of the peace, or other legal officer authorized to administer an oath and take depositions under the laws of the State or Territory from which such person owing service or labor may have escaped, with a certificate of such magistracy or other authority, as aforesaid, with the seal of the proper court or officer thereto attached, which seal shall be sufficient to establish the competency of the proof, and with proof, also by affidavit, of the identity of the person whose service or labor is claimed to be due as aforesaid, that the person so arrested does in fact owe service or labor to the person or persons claiming him or her, in the State or Territory from which such fugitive may have escaped as aforesaid, and that said person escaped, to make out and deliver to such claimant, his or her agent or attorney, a certificate setting forth the substantial facts as to the service or labor due from such fugitive to the claimant, and of his or her escape from the State or Territory in which he or she was arrested, with authority to such claimant, or his or her agent or attorney, to use such reasonable force and restraint as may be necessary, under the circumstances of the case, to take and remove such fugitive person back to the State or Territory whence he or she may have escaped as aforesaid. In no trial or hearing under this act shall the testimony of such alleged fugitive be admitted in evidence; and the certificates in this and the first [fourth] section mentioned, shall be conclusive of the right of the person or persons in whose favor granted, to remove such fugitive to the State or Territory from which he escaped, and shall prevent all molestation of such person or persons by any process issued by any court, judge, magistrate, or other person whomsoever.
Lincoln's bill did not have any of the court and commissioner hearings and potential safeguards that the 1850 fugitive slave act had.
Rusbucket, I have lost a lot of respect for you with that post.
For that, I'm sorry. Apparently I pointed out that Lincoln proposed to arrest and return fugitive slaves and that doesn't fit the standard Lincoln narrative. I'd never heard that before. I found reference to this proposal of Lincoln's in the book "April 1865" by Jay Winik. Winik says,
It was to be enacted by local referendum, but the politician in him led Lincoln to soften the blow, adding a section that required municipal authorities of Washington and Georgetown to provide "active and efficient means" of arresting and restoring to their owners all fugitive slaves escaping into the District. In effect, the bill sought to split the difference between the two extremes of slave owners and slaver haters, but in seeking to offend nobody, Lincoln only ended up offending everyone. As soon as his plans were made public, all support for the measure vanished.
Winik's book has been given high praise, such as by the New York Times Link -- "marvelous book" "brilliant" "freshness of the argument". It is one of the better books I have ever read about the war. I recommend it to you.