In a
land where freedom of speech was held to be an unquestioned right,
freedom of thought ceased to exist, and men were incarcerated for
opinion's sake.
In the Maryland Legislature, the Hon. S. Teacle Wallis, from a committee
to whom was referred the memorial of the police commissioners arrested
in Baltimore, made a report upon the unconstitutionality of the act, and
"appealed in the most earnest manner to the whole people of the country,
of all parties, sections, and opinions, to take warnings by the
usurpations mentioned, and come to the rescue of the free institutions
of the country."[177]
For no better reason, so far as the public was informed, than a vote in
favor of certain resolutions, General Banks sent his provost-marshal to
Frederick, where the Legislature was in session; a cordon of pickets was
placed around the town to prevent any one from leaving it without a
written permission from a member of General Banks's staff; police
detectives from Baltimore then went into the town and arrested some
twelve or thirteen members and several officers of the Legislature,
which, thereby left without a quorum, was prevented from organizing, and
it performed the only act which it was competent to do, i.e., adjourned.
S. Teacle Wallis, the author of the report in defense of the
constitutional rights of citizens, was among those arrested. Henry May,
a member of Congress, who had introduced a resolution which he hoped
would be promotive of peace, was another of those arrested and thrown
into prison.
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