was viewed in the Southern states as a brazen violation of the federal compact. A constituent complained by letter to South Carolina Senator John C. Calhoun that the new personal liberty laws "rendered slave property utterly insecure" and constituted a "flagrant violation of the spirit of the U.S. Constitution". Increasing sectional tension over slavery resulted in the Compromise of 1850, which covered several issues related to the status of territories acquired in the Mexican–American War: the South allowed California to enter the Union as a free state, but the Northern states would have to agree to a strengthened Fugitive Slave Act that required law enforcement in free states to cooperate in the capture and return of fugitive slaves within their borders. The South had been forced to look to the federal government for a national solution. The Supreme Court had pledged itself in advance to support such a solution, although aware that many persons in the North would certainly be mobilized against it. In addition, people began to believe that the Court was uniquely qualified to soothe the growing agitation over slavery. But the Liberty Party platform of 1843 (adopted in advance of the 1844 presidential election) condemned the Prigg v. Pennsylvania decision. It said this ruling nullified habeas corpus protection for free blacks, and took away their "whole legal security of personal freedom". See also List of United States Supreme Court cases, volume 41 American slave court cases Freedom suits Ableman v. Booth – similar case related to Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 Dred Scott v. Sandford – freedom suit case Printz v. United States – similar case on federal laws commandeering state and local law enforcement References Further reading Burke, Joseph C., "What Did the Prigg Decision Really Decide?" Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography, Vol. 93, No. 1 (January 1969), pp. 73–85 in JSTOR Finkelman, Paul, "Prigg v. Pennsylvania: Understanding Justice Story's Pro-Slavery Nationalism, Vol. 2 Journal of Supreme Court History (1997) pp. 51-64 . Finkelman, Paul, "Sorting Out Prigg v. Pennsylvania," 24 Rutgers Law Journal (1993) pp. 605–665 Finkelman, Paul, "Story Telling on the Supreme Court: Prigg v. Pennsylvania and Justice Joseph Story's Judicial Nationalism," 1994 Supreme Court Review (1995) pp. 247–294 Finkelman, Paul, Supreme Injustice: Slavery in the Nation's Highest Court. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press (2018). . Review Goldstein, Leslie Friedman, "A 'Triumph of Freedom' after All? Prigg v. Pennsylvania Re-examined" Law and History