The Levitz Affair was a diplomatic incident between the United States and Confederate States in 1887. Rory Levitz, a Confederate slave catcher, was found and arrested in Kentucky on charges of trying to practice slavery in the United States by catching a runaway slave. The United States government refused to release him back to the Confederacy.
The Incident[]
Rory Levitz was a longtime slave catcher working to return escaped slaves to their owners in the South. Slave catchers generally avoided following slaves into the United States as that was outside of their jurisdiction. This became even more common after slavery was abolished in the Union and attempting to catch a former slave could carry harsh criminal penalties. In May 1887, however, Levitz decided to continue tracking an escaped slave over the the US border into Kentucky. He would later say that he was simply especially determined to get his payment after the long and arduous process of tracking a slave all the way from Alabama.
Levitz was soon caught by Kentucky law enforcement who found his activities there to be suspicious. It wasn't hard to verify his profession and his purpose for being in the country- soon, he disclosed the specific nature of the job and admitted his desire to catch the escaped slave on US soil. He was imprisoned and charged with slaveholding, recently made illegal across the United States.
Other incidents of this nature had occurred prior but none gained the same level of notoriety as this one. Slave catching was not considered illegal in the United States up until the repeal of the last fugitive slave law in 1885. Only after that point was it considered criminal to attempt to catch escaped slaves in the US. Other slave catchers had strayed a small ways over the border and simply been sent back. Some had been arrested and then released without much scrutiny. The national attitude towards the Confederacy and slavery had grown more hostile by 1887, however, and Levitz would be forced to stand trial for his actions.
The Confederate government protested his arrest, claiming that it was not illegal to recover "lost contraband" that had been illegally transported over an international border. The United States government rejected the assertion that an escaped slave was property. President Depew of the US stated that the South had lost its ability to have any say in the laws of the United States when they seceded. In any case, it was a crime committed on US soil and they had the right to enforce their law. The Confederacy responded that the free movement clause of the Treaty of Alexandria meant that the United States couldn't unilaterally hold a Confederate citizen and prevent them from crossing back into the Confederacy. The US rejected this argument as well and tried Levitz, eventually sentencing him to five years in prison.
Confederate President Augustus Garland personally believed that the US was well within their rights in the case. However, when the incident became public knowledge and incited outrage across the Confederacy, he knew he would have to pursue it to avoid losing political capital.
Aftermath and Legacy[]
The Confederate States soon ended any attempts to regain Levitz. Other slave catchers heeded the warning and stayed out of US territory. The incident was largely forgotten until the uncovering of the Potts Conspiracy two years later. In that case, the United States asked for extradition for the plotters that had been captured by the Confederacy, and the Confederate government promptly refused, citing the Levitz Affair as precedent.
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