make the fi rst experiment.” T ough only 24, Morris had been well trained and was an “assertive and aggressive” individual who did not shy from confrontation. “T ere was something in the courtroom that made me


feel like a giant,” Morris later wrote about that day. “[It] was fi lled with colored people and I could see, expressed on the faces of every one of them, a wish that I might win.” When the jury ruled in favor of the plaintiff , Morris said that his heart pounded. “My people in the courtroom acted as if they would shout for joy.” Morris’s stature rose overnight, and by the time the


second Fugitive Slave Law passed on Sept. 20, 1850, he was a leader in the Boston black community. A stronger version of the Fugitive law passed in 1793. It not only increased penalties for aiding fugitive slaves, but made it easier for slaveholders to reclaim those who had fl ed. Perhaps most abhorrent to the North was that the law compelled all citizens to assist in the apprehension of fugitive slaves or be subject to prosecution. In conjunction with the law’s passage, the federal govern-


Among the pressing issues of the day was the repeal of


miscegenation laws banning marriage between blacks and whites, and the desegregation of public transportation and the public schools. Morris had begun confronting the city’s Jim Crow laws by sitting where he was prohibited, buying tickets to white-only theaters, or attending white churches, forcing the authorities to eject him so that whites could wit- ness the ugly face of prejudice. Shortly after his admittance to the Massachusetts bar


in 1847, Morris was asked to represent a black laborer in a dispute with his white employer. At the time, Morris was one of only two black lawyers in the nation. T ere were roughly 24,000 attorneys in the country at that time. “I thought of the mighty odds against which I had


to contend,” Morris later said. Nonetheless, he vowed to “prove myself to be a man and a gentleman, and succeed in the practice of law, or I would die.” T e signifi cance of the case was not lost on observers.


Prior to the trial, T e Liberator commented that many could “rejoice that it fell to the lot of someone so well fi tted to


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ment promised increased vigilance in the apprehension of fugitive slaves. Within a month, attempts were made to capture celebrated fugitive slaves such as: Henry “Box” Brown, who had escaped to freedom in a box from Richmond, Virginia; and William and Ellen Craft, the Georgia couple who had escaped by disguising fair-skinned Ellen as the young male owner of her husband. T e government’s commitment to capturing fugitives caused panic among the newly freed blacks, resulting in a mass exodus of many to Canada. Two weeks later, a widely advertised meeting was called


at Boston’s Faneuil Hall. A huge crowd listened to resolu- tions to aid and protect all fugitive slaves, and use any and all means to resist the new law. A special committee, the Boston Vigilance Committee, was appointed to protect those whose freedom was jeopardized. It started with 50 men and eventually grew to 209. Morris went on to play a critical role in the daring


and successful rescue of Virginia fugitive Shadrach Minkins. T ree days after Minkins’ rescue, President Millard Fillmore issued a special proclamation calling for the prosecution of those involved in the rescue. With the assistance of the Vigilance Committee’s able lawyers and sympathetic jurors, neither Morris nor any of the others were found guilty. As triumphant as he was in the Minkins rescue, Morris made his greatest contribution to civil


JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2011 DIVERSITY & THE BAR®


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