“If you pass a law which shall require a trial by jury, not one man in twenty whose slave escapes will incur the risks or expense of going after the fugitive. It proposes a trial according to all the forms of the court. _A trial by jury necessarily carries with it a trial of the whole right_, and a trial of the right to service will be gone into according to all the forms of the court in determining upon any other fact.… This involves the detention of the fugitive in the mean time,--a detention that is purely informal; and whether the jury should or should not render a righteous verdict in the end is a matter I will not inquire into, for it is perfectly immaterial, _as the delay itself would effectually defeat the right of reclamation_.”[367] Thus, in a question of Human Freedom, the delay incident to trial by jury was unblushingly asserted as a sufficient reason for denial of the right. On a pretension so repulsive, it is enough to say that its feebleness is exceeded only by its audacity. The Committee, therefore, put aside the attempts at reply, and confidently rest in the conclusion that the denial of trial by jury to a person claimed as slave is an unquestionable violation of the Constitution. UNCONSTITUTIONAL DELEGATION OF JUDICIAL POWER TO COMMISSIONERS WHO ARE NOT JUDGES. There is still another objection from unconstitutionality, which may be treated more briefly; but it is not less decisive than the two objections already considered. It is founded on the character of the magistrate to whom is committed the adjudication of the great question of Human Freedom, than which none greater is known to the law. If it were a question merely of property above twenty dollars,--if it were a question of crime, involving imprisonment under the laws of the United States,--especially if it were a question involving life,--the trial must be before a judge duly appointed by the President by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, holding office during good behavior, receiving for his services a fixed compensation, and bound by solemn oath of office. But this great question of Human Freedom is committed to the unaided judgment of a petty magistrate, called a commissioner, appointed by the Court instead of the President, holding his office during the will of the Court instead of during good behavior, paid by fees according to each individual case, instead of receiving for his services a fixed compensation, and not bound by any oath of office. A claim for the rendition of a fugitive from service or labor, constituting as it does “a suit at Common Law,” and also “a case arising under the Constitution,” must be determined by a _judicial tribunal_. But a commissioner is not a judicial tribunal, nor is he in any sense a judge; so that he is not entitled, under the Constitution, to exercise this extraordinary jurisdiction.