r mulatto person or persons
are the property of him or her who applies, to any associate
judge or justice of the peace within the State, the associate
judge or justice is hereby empowered and required, by his
precept, to direct the sheriff or constable to arrest such black
or mulatto person or persons, and deliver the same, in the county
or township where such officers shall reside, to the claimant or
claimants, or his or their agent or agents, for which service the
sheriff or constable shall receive such compensation as he is
entitled to receive in other cases for similar services."

7. "That any person or persons who shall attempt to remove or
shall remove from this State, or who shall aid and assist in
removing, contrary to the provisions of this act, any black or
mulatto person or persons, without first proving, as herein
before directed, that he, she, or they is or are legally entitled
so to do, shall, on conviction thereof before any court having
cognizance of the same, forfeit and pay the sum of one thousand
dollars, one half to the use of the informer and the other half
to the use of the State, to be recovered by the action of debt
_quitam_ or indictment, and shall moreover be liable to the
action of the party injured."

So here upon free soil, under a State government that did not
recognize slavery in its constitution, the Negro was compelled to
produce a certificate of freedom. Thus the fugitive-slave law was
recognized, but at the same time an unlawful removal of free Negroes
from the State was forbidden.

At the session of 1806-7, "_An Act to Amend the Act Entitled 'an Act
Regulating Black and Mulatto Persons_,'" was passed amending the old
law. The first act simply required "a certificate of freedom"; the
amended law required Negroes and Mulattoes intending to settle in Ohio
to give a bond not to become a charge upon the county in which they
settled. Section four reads as follows:

"4. That no black or mulatto person or persons shall hereafter be
permitted to be sworn or give evidence in any court of record or
elsewhere in this State, in any cause depending or matter of
controversy where either party to the sale is a white person, or
in any prosecution which shall be instituted in behalf of this
State, against any white person."[38]

But this law did not apply to persons a