In 1842 he delivered an address on the " Progress and Results of Emancipation in the West Indies," and to his far-seeing mind the time seemed not distant when a similar result would be accomplished in our own land. la 1844, when the question of Texan annexation was attracting the attention of the country, he was the organizer of a demonstration against the project, and was supported by many of the most distinguished men of the day, the presiding officer of the meeting being the venerable Albert Gallatin, the last survivor of the Cabinet of Jefferson. Although in the Presidential contest which succeeded, a strong effort was made to induce the Abolitionists to cast their votes for Henry Clay, yet, through the influence of Mr. Jay, and the leaders whose views were identical with his own, sixty thousand votes were given by the new party for the Hon. John P. Hale, who was thus the first Anti-Slavery candidate presented for the suffrages of the country.

In the practice of his profession Mr. Jay was frequently called upon to defend in the courts persons arrested as fugitive slaves. In the peculiar state of feeling which then existed, the defense of these cases could not fail to attract public attention in all sections of the country, and the reported cases, among which may be mentioned "In re Kirk," "la re Da Costa " and the famous " Lemon Case," which were conducted by him with matchless ability, must ever be an important chapter in the legal hi.story of the times.