What were the punishments for violation of the Fugitive Slave Act?

The Fugitive Slave Act was part of the Compromise of 1850. This law required northerners to assist with the capture and with the return of runaway slaves. With the passage of this law, a runaway slave could only be assured of being free by escaping to Canada where slavery was illegal. It would now be possible that a runaway slave living in a free state could be captured and could be returned to the South. It also didn’t matter when a slave escaped to the North. Any escaped slave from any period of time could be captured and returned to the South.

There were punishments associated with violating the Fugitive Slave Act. Anybody interfering with the process of capturing a runaway slave could be fined up to $1000 and placed in jail for six months. Also, federal officials, who stood to gain more financially by returning a runaway slave than by letting that runaway slave go free, heard individual cases.