Just prior to the
Civil War northern juries sometimes refused to convict for violations of the
Fugitive Slave Act because jurors felt the laws to be unjust. In 1851, 24 people were indicted for
helping a fugitive escape from a jail in
Syracuse, New York. The first four trials of the group resulted in three acquittals and one conviction, and the government dropped the remaining charges. Likewise, after a crowd broke into a Boston courtroom and rescued
Anthony Burns, a slave, the grand jury indicted three of those involved, but after an acquittal and several hung juries, the government dropped the charges