Supreme Court, by the provisions of chapter thirty-eight of the Revised Statutes, entitled Of Habeas Corpus.'

"Sect. 2. It shall be the duty of State's Attorneys, within their respective counties, whenever any inhabitant of this State is arrested or claimed as a Fugitive Slave, on being informed thereof, diligently and faithfully to use all lawful means to protect, defend, and procure to be discharged every such person so arrested or claimed as a Fugitive Slave.

"Sect. 3. The application of a State's Attorney in writing to any one of the Judges of the Supreme Court, or to any Circuit Judge, signed by the State's Attorney in his official capacity, stating in substance the names of the prisoner and the persons detaining him, if known, and the person arrested, claimed, or imprisoned, if arrested, claimed, or imprisoned as a Fugitive Slave, shall be sufficient authority to authorize the issuing of a habeas corpus, as provided in said chapter thirty-eight of the Revised Statutes, and said writ may be signed by any one of said Judges, or the Clerk of the Supreme or County Court; and said writ shall be made returnable to the Supreme or County Court, when in Session in the County where such application is made; and in vacation said writ may be made returnable forthwith before either of the Judges aforesaid.

"Sect. 4. It shall be the duty of all Judicial and Executive officers in the State, in their respective counties, who shall know or have good reason to believe, that any inhabitant of this State is about to be arrested or claimed as a Fugitive Slave, forthwith to give notice thereof to the State's Attorney of the county in which such person resides.

"Sect. 5. Whenever the writ of habeas corpus is granted in vacation as provided in this act, or as provided by existing laws, if upon the hearing of the same before any one of the Judges aforesaid, the person imprisoned, arrested, or claimed as a Fugitive Slave, shall not be discharged, such person shall be entitled to an appeal to the next stated term of the County Court in the county where such hearing was had, on furnishing such bail, and within such time as the Judge granting the writ, on hearing the case, shall adjudge to be reasonable and proper.

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Sect. 6. The Court to which such appeal is taken, and any other Court to which a writ of habeas corpus in behalf of any such person claimed or arrested as a Fugitive Slave is made returnable, may and shall, on application of either party to such proceeding, allow and direct a trial by jury, on all questions of fact in issue between the parties, in the matter aforesaid, and the taxable costs of such trial shall be chargeable to the State, whenever the same would be otherwise chargeable to the person arrested or claimed as a Fugitive Slave.

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Sect. 7. The several Circuit Judges shall have the same power now vested in the Judges of the Supreme Court, by virtue of an act in amendment of chapter one hundred and three of the Revised Statutes, relating to persons confined in close jail, on executions of tort, approved November 13, A. D., 1848.

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Sect. 8. This act shall take effect from its passage.'

This law has, of course, drawn down upon Vermont, for thus performing the first of political duties, the denunciation and vituperation of the Slaveholders and their northern tools and parasites. But we trust that she will be unremoved as one of her own Green Mountains, and not consent to be cast into the flood of disgrace and infamy, which her advisers and her threateners alike wish to overwhelm her.

We are happy to see that a step in the direction of the noble way opened by Vermont has been taken in the Assembly of New York, by Mr. COFFIN, of Otsego. This gentleman has introduced a bill having the same object of that of Vermont, though less stringent in its details. After providing for the punishment of any person engaged in arresting, or attempting to arrest, any free citizen of the State, with intent to remove him beyond the jurisdiction, or in so removing him, it thus defines who shall be considered a free citizen:—

Any person who shall have openly and publicly resided in this State for one year preceding such arrest or removal, or attempted arrest or removal as aforesaid, shall in all courts and places be deemed, and held to be a free citizen of this State, within the true intent and meaning of this act, until the contrary is proved as provided in the next section."

The third section provides for the acquittal of the defendant in case the person arrested should be proved to be a Slave. We earnestly hope that this, or some more effectual law, will be pressed to a passage there; and that similar legislation, wisely following or improving upon these examples, may illustrate the present year of our own State history. Let it never be said that Massachusetts knew that the most helpless of her citizens were in peril of losing all they have and are, and refused to interpose the shield of law between them and their perdition.

ANTI-SLAVERY OPERATIONS.

During the year past, the Society has been actively employed, to the extent of its means, in arousing the conscience of the people of this Commonwealth to the sin and dishonor of their union with the Slaveholding States. Immediately after the Annual meeting, the corps of lecturing agents was re-organized, and the lecturing field occupied at once. The speech of Mr. WEBSTER, in the United States Senate, of the seventh of March, gave a powerful impetus to the efforts of the

agents. A new interest in the question of Slavery, in all its bearings, was awakened, and their meetings were attended by increased numbers. Upon the publication of the pamphlet of MOSES STUART, of Andover, in defence and support of Mr. WEBSTER's speech, that interest was still further increased. And it is the testimony of the agents generally, that they have never known a year, in which so wide-spread and general an assent has been given to their plainest utterances, and to their keenest rebukes of those men, high in State and in Church, who have been bargaining to betray every remaining virtue of the North into the hands of the Slaveholders and Slave-hunters. At the New England Anti-Slavery Convention, in May, a series of One Hundred Conventions, to be held in the New England States, was set on foot, a sum of money was subscribed or pledged towards the support of these Conventions, and the work of arranging and carrying them forward was confided to the officers of the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society. These Conventions were commenced in the month of June, and have been held as regularly as circumstances would permit up to the present time. The necessities of the Cause, in the Middle and Western States, have frequently called our lecturers away from us, for a season, and we have looked on in sorrow, as we have seen the fields at home white to the harvest, and the laborers so few. The Conventions have been held in Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Connecticut, and Rhode Island. They have been attended and sustained, as lecturing agents, by STEPHEN S. FOSTER, ABBY KELLEY FOSTER, PARKER PILLSBURY, CHARLES C. BURLEIGH, and the General Agent of this Society, SAMUEL MAY, Jr. During the summer and early autumn, Mr. GARRISON attended one or more of these meetings nearly every week, and rendered invaluable assistance. WENDELL PHILLIPS, EDMUND QUINCY, and NATHANIEL H. WHITING, were also occasionally present, and always to the manifest advantage of the Cause. In the early part of the year we had the aid of LucY STONE, as a lecturing agent, a most faithful and at the same time most pleasing advocate of the Cause. We much lament that we have been so long deprived of her services. A severe illness in the summer so far prostrated her strength, as to have disqualified her hitherto for the fatigue and exposure of the winter life of an Anti-Slavery lecturer. We hope that her health may be restored, and with it her effective service in behalf of this Society. It may be proper that we should just advert to the labors of our friends in other parts of the country. Under the auspices of the American Anti-Slavery Society, and of the State Societies, lecturing

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agents have been sustained, meetings held, publications issued, and funds collected, in Central and Western New York, in Pennsylvania, and in Ohio. Mrs. FOSTER, PARKER PILLSBURY, and HENRY C. WRIGHT have labored indefatigably, mainly in northern Ohio, but also to some extent in New York, Pennsylvania, and Indiana. Self-exiled from their homes and families, for the Slave's sake, these zealous and faithful servants of the Cause have welcomed every toil and privation, that they might preach, in the guilty ears of those who love this Union more than they care for man or fear God, the deliverance of the captive and the setting at liberty of them that are bruised. How fervent should be our prayer that the Lord of the harvest would send forth more such laborers into his harvest.

We should not omit to say that, during the year past, a greater number of professed Christian ministers have given their sympathy and active co-operation to the measures and agents of our Society, than we have ever known before. In some instances, religious societies, with their pastor at their head, have suspended their customary services that they might attend and participate in the Anti-Slavery meetings; and we have not heard of a single instance, in which they felt any regret for having done so. Methodist, Universalist, and Unitarian Societies have, in this way, opened to us their doors. These instances are far from numerous, yet enough to indicate, in a most encouraging manner, the continued growth of Anti-Slavery principles in New England.

ANNIVERSARY OF THE AMERICAN ANTI-SLAVERY SOCIETY.

The last Anniversary of the Parent Society was one of the most important and significant events in our Anti-Slavery history. The excitement which had been created and promoted at Washington, for the purpose of raising an alarm, under the cover of which Slavery might accomplish its ends, was made to find fuel in our Annual Gathering. The new zeal for the safety of the Union, (the latest name that Slavery has received at the hands of its sponsors,) attracted attention to our meeting, as that of the Northern Disunionists. The New York Herald, which has undertaken to be the organ of the Union it so well represents, with other prints of approximating vileness, had been busy in advance in preparing the public mind for this expected onslaught upon our dearest institutions. They at least summoned to the rescue of the country, Captain ISAIAH

RYNDERS, of the Empire Club, an Association of ruffians which seems to have superseded the functions of the magistracy of New York. The Anniversary opened on Tuesday, the seventh of May, in the Tabernacle, with the fullest possible attendance. The preliminary services went off without disturbance, and it was some time before the disorderly crew present found occasion to interfere. And, at last, it was the statement by Mr. GARRISON, that President TAYLOR was a Christian, that produced the first interference of the leader of the mob! The recital of all the particulars of that scene would consume more space than we can spare. It was a striking exemplification of the force of moral power to curb brute violence. Notwithstanding the set purpose of Rynders and his crew to break up the meeting, still, such was the fairness and reasonableness of the treatment that they received from its officers, that the proceedings, though frequently interrupted, went on regularly to the close. The Rev. Dr. FURNESS, of Philadelphia, made a most admirable speech. Mr. DOUGLASS distinguished himself by the eloquence and pathos which are his natural characteristics, and which actually charmed Rynders and his rabble rout to silence and attention. A Dr. GRANT was heard, at the request of the Rynders party, on the organic inferiority of the Negro race, and Mr. WARD, a pure Negro, replied to him. The audience was immense, and the effect of the whole meeting, of its disturbance as of its orderly proceeding, must have produced a powerful effect upon those in attendance.

In the afternoon, the business meeting was held in the Lecture Room of the Society Library, and the first preliminaries of business arranged. The meeting in the evening was broken up by a disorderly body of men near the door and in the passages, which prevented the speeches from being heard. The next morning the Society met in the same place. But Captain RYNDERS and his patriotic band was also there, and better instructed in his duty than the day before. Soon after the reading of the resolutions and the opening of the meeting they commenced their work and did it systematically and thoroughly. Mr. BURLEIGH, Mr. PHILLIPS, and others attempted to get the ear of the mob; but it had been told by its employers, doubtless, that its duty was not to be reasonable but to break up the meeting. So Rynders would not even allow Dr. GRANT to be heard, on the ground that, if he did, he must, in fairness, allow a reply. So the meeting, after staying till near the time of adjournment, broke up without transacting any of its business. The police of the city were present,