An Imperfect Union: Slavery, Federalism and Comity.
Finkelman, Paul. An Imperfect Union: Slavery, Federalism and Comity. Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 1981. Octavo. 9" x 6". xii, 378 pp. Reprint The Lawbook Exchange, Ltd., 2013. ISBN-13: 9781584770923. Hardcover. New. $49.95 * A detailed examination of the legal and constitutional turmoil that ensued when enslaved people were brought into free states. Finkelman analyzes the complex intersection of conflict of laws, interstate comity, and federal obligations under Article IV, demonstrating how judicial disputes over northern transit and residency threatened the nationalization of slavery and accelerated the breakdown of the Union. This work stands as the definitive study on how the Fugitive Slave Clause and the Interstate Comity Clause created irreconcilable legal friction, tracing the evolution of northern Personal Liberty Laws designed to counteract southern state statutes. Ultimately, Finkelman maps the essential legal framework that directly precursored the Dred Scott v. Sandford (1857) decision, illustrating how southern states shifted from requesting state-to-state courtesy to demanding national protections for human property on free soil.
Price: $49.95
Book number 28529