decided that the justices of the peace in the respective States could not be called upon to execute the law for the rendition of fugitive slaves, a clause was inserted in the Fugitive Slave Law of 1850, providing for the appointment of United States commissioners, before whom such cases could be tried.

The Fugitive Slave Law.

The Northern States successively enacted laws for the nullification of the provisions of this law. All their jails and other State buildings were refused to the federal officers for the securing of fugitive slaves, and all State, county, and city officers were forbidden to arrest or assist in arresting or detaining any fugitive slave. In many of the States severe punishments were denounced against masters coming within their limits to claim their slaves, and such fugitives entering these States were declared free. These laws were denounced by the slaveholding States as violative of the constitution of the United States, and gave rise to great bitterness of feeling toward the North. It was maintained that these laws were direct evidence of the intention of the northern people to rob the South of its property in negro slaves.

The extremists of the South were equally dissatisfied with the compromise. They declared that the South had sacrificed everything and gained nothing by it, and boldly avowed their intention to bring about the secession of the Southern States from the Union. In the summer of 1850 a southern convention was held at Nashville, Ten

ear to the appeals of the disunionists, and the convention failed to accomplish its object.

In the inauguration of a territorial government for Utah, the Mormons, whose settlement in that Territory while it was yet a possession of Mexico we have related, endeavored to frame their own government, and gave to the Territory the name of Deseret, which they declared was a word of their peculiar language meaning “The Land of the Honey Bee." the Honey Bee." President Fillmore set aside this name and carried out the act of Congress by which the Territory received its present name. Brigham Young, the Mormon leader or prophet, was appointed governor of the Territory.

In 1850 the seventh census showed the population of the United States to be 23,191,876 souls.

Capture of General Lopez.

In the early part of President Taylor's administration, General Lopez, a Spaniard, began to enlist men in the United States ostensibly for the purpose of aiding the people of the island of Cuba to throw off their allegiance to Spain and establish their independence, but really for the purpose of driving out the Spaniards and securing the annexation of Cuba to the United States. He succeeded in inducing a number of adventurous persons to join him.

President Taylor, upon learning of the movement, issued a proclamation forbidding citizens of the United States to engage in it. In spite of this warning, Lopez collected a force of six hundred men, and eluding the vigilance of the United States officers, sailed for Cuba. He landed at Cardenas, but received so little encouragement that the party sailed for Key West. In 1851, Lopez again entered Cuba, this time at the head of four hundred and fifty men. His party was

captured almost immediately, and he and a number of his men were put to death by the Spanish authorities at Havana.

In May, 1850, an expedition of a different character sailed from the United States. The fate of Sir John Franklin, who sailed from England in 1845, in search of the northwest passage, had long enlisted the sympathies of humane and generous souls. It was thought that the daring navigator might be confined to the Arctic regions by the loss. of his ships, and that a well-executed search might either result in the discovery and relief of Franklin or settle the question as to his fate. Mr. Henry Grinnell, a wealthy merchant of New York, fitted out an expedition at his own expense, and placing it under the command of Lieutenant De Haven, of the United States navy, despatched it to the Arctic regions to search for Franklin and his men, in May, 1850. De Haven was accompanied by Dr. E. K. Kane, in the capacity of surgeon and naturalist. After a year's absence the vessels returned, the search having been unsuccessful. The general government

despatched another expedition in 1851, on the same errand, and placed it under command of Dr. Kane. This expedition was absent four years, and the government, becoming apprehensive of its fate, sent two vessels to search for Kane and his companions. They were

found at the isle of Disco, in Greenland, having been forced to abandon their vessel in the ice. Nothing was learned by Dr. Kane concerning the fate of Sir John Franklin; but the expedition resulted in the discovery of the open Polar sea. Nothing

SIR JOHN FRANKLIN.

definite was learned of the fate of Sir John Franklin until 1859, when the steamer "Fox," despatched by Lady Franklin, made the melancholy discovery that Sir John Franklin died on the eleventh of June, 1847, and in 1848 the "Erebus" and "Terror "

Alexander H. Stephens has said of him: "He was too great a man and had too great an intellect not to see the truth when it was presented, and he was too honest and too patriotic a man not to proclaim the truth when he saw it, even to an unwilling people.

ing firmness is one of the grandest features. in the general grandeur of his character. Even his detractors have been constrained to render him unwilling homage in this respect."* His memory was honored by appropriate demonstrations in all parts of the country, and it is said that the popular