c. 25. An act to amend the act for the better government of servants and slaves (1753, c. 7): in respect to runaways. c. 26. An act to amend the act (1748, c. 38) which for the trial of slaves required the issue of a special commission :Sec. 1, provides for issuing commissions of oyer and terminer, directed to the justices of each county respectively, empowering them from time to time to try, condemn and execute, or otherwise punish or acquit, all slaves committing capital crimes within their county; and when any commission for constituting justices of the peace shall hereafter issue, a general commission of oyer and terminer for the purposes aforesaid shall be sent therewith, &c. 2. Court how convened, &c., "without the solemnity of a jury," &c. Another sec. allows benefit of clergy where a slave is convicted of manslaughter for killing a slave.-8 Hen. 133, 135, 137.

1769, c. 19. An act to amend the act, &c., (the same act of 1748, c. 38.) Sec. 1, reciting that by the act "the county courts within this dominion are impowered to punish outlying slaves who cannot be reclaimed, which punishment is often disproportioned to the offence and contrary to the principles of humanity. Be it, &c., that it shall not be lawful for any county court to order and direct castration of any slave, except such slave shall be convicted of an attempt to ravish a white woman, in which case they may inflict such punishment.”

The remaining sections relate to runaway slaves.

c. 37. An act for exempting free negro, mulatto, and Indian women from the payment of levies-referring to previous statutes declaring such persons tithable, and chargeable with public, &c., levies, "which is found very burdensome to such negroes, mulattoes, and Indians, and is moreover derogatory to the rights of freeborn subjects"-enacts that "all free negro, mulatto and Indian women, and all wives, other than slaves, of free negroes, mulattoes and Indians," shall be exempted.-8 Hen. 358, 393.

1772,1 c. 9. An act for amending the acts concerning the

As an expression of the sense of the people of Virginia, at this time, on the subject of slavery: see Petition of the House of Burgesses, April 1, 1772, addressed to

trials and outlawries of slaves. Sec. 1. Slaves convicted of housebreaking in the night, are not excluded from clergy unless a freeman in the like case would be so. 2. Sentence of death not to be passed upon a slave, unless four of the court, being a majority, concur. 3. That no justice or justices of the peace of this Colony shall, by virtue of the said act, issue a proclamation against any slave authorizing any person to kill or destroy such slave, unless it shall appear to the satisfaction of such justice or justices that such slave is outlying and doing mischief; and if any slave shall hereafter be killed or destroyed by virtue of any proclamation, issued contrary to this act, the owner or proprietor of such slave shall not be paid for such slave by the public; any thing in the said recited act (1748, c. 38. § 21, 22.) to the contrary, &c.

1775. Ordinance of convention, c. 4, sec. 2, that the voters for representatives shall be "the freeholders properly qualified by law to vote for burgesses;" c. 7, one clause provides for the transportation to the West India islands of any slave, "taken in arms against this colony, or in the possession of an enemy, through their own choice," by the Committee of Safety :-the owners to be paid. 9 Hen. 106.

1776, June 12. By the Convention of Delegates, the ordinance 9 Hen. 109, unanimously adopted, known as the Virginia Declaration of Rights (1 Hen. 47), of which the first article reads, "That all men are by nature equally free and independent, and have certain inherent rights of which when they enter into a state of society, they cannot by any compact deprive or divest their posterity; namely the enjoyment of life and liberty, with the means of acquiring and possessing property, and the pursuing and obtaining happiness and safety.' The fourth

the King, "to remove all those restraints on your Majesty's governors of this colony which may inhibit their assenting to such laws as may check so very pernicious a commerce," meaning the importation of slaves, 2 Tucker's Blackstone, App. 51.

66

'See conflict of judicial opinion as to the personal extent of this article in Hudgins v. Wrights, 1 Hen. & Munford's R. pp. 134, 143. Wherein the Chancellor, George Wythe (one of the signers of the Continental Declaration of Independence), on the ground that freedom is the birth-right of every human being, which sentiment is strongly inculcated in the first article of our 'political catechism,' the bill of rights he laid it down as a general position, that whenever one person claims to hold another in slavery, the onus probandi lies on the claimant." The Court of Appeals

article-"That no man or set of men are entitled to exclusive or separate emoluments or privileges from the community, &c." The sixth-" That all men, having sufficient evidence of permanent common interest with and attachment to the community, have the right of suffrage," &c.

1776, June 26. In the preamble to the Constitution or form of government, 9 Hen. 112, adopted by the Delegates, is recited that the King had perverted the kingly office into a "detestable and insupportable tyranny, by " &c., among which-" prompting our negroes to rise in arms among us— those very negroes whom, by an inhuman use of his negative, he hath refused us permission to exclude by law." No formal bill of rights is incorporated with this constitution. The seventh article provides that "the right of suffrage in the election of members for both Houses, shall remain as exercised at present."

§ 219. LEGISLATION OF MARYLAND.

The territory constituting the present State of Maryland had, before the grant to Lord Baltimore, June 20, 1632,' been included within the limits of the Virginia colony. Whatever laws had territorial extent in Virginia before that date, may be taken to have been law in Maryland.

1637. In the assembly of this year, the first of the colony, the freemen agreed to a number of bills which were never enacted

held :-"This Court, not approving of the Chancellor's principles and reasoning in his decree made in this cause, except so far as the same relates to white persons and native American Indians, but entirely disapproving thereof so far as the same relates to native Africans and their descendants, who have been and are now held as slaves by the citizens of this State, and discovering no other error," &c.

1 The charter, s. 7, granted legislative powers to the Lord Proprietor, "with the advice, assent and approbation of the freemen of the same province or the greater part of them, or of their delegates or deputies," * "so, nevertheless, that the laws aforesaid be consonant to reason, and be not repugnant or contrary, but (so far as conveniently may be) agreeable to the laws, statutes, customs and rights of this our kingdom of England." Sec. 8, mentions "the Freeholders of the said Province, their delegates, &c. Sec. 10, provides, "that all and singular the subjects and liegemen of us, our heirs and successors, transplanted or hereafter to be transplanted into the province aforesaid, and the children of them and of others their descendants, whether already born there or hereafter to be born, be and shall be natives and liegemen of us, &c., &c. * and likewise all privileges, franchises, and liberties of this our kingdom of England, freely, &c., have and possess," &c., &c. Bacon's laws of Maryland.

*

into laws. A list only of these has been preserved, of which one is A bill for punishment of ill servants, another for limiting the times of service. See Bacon's laws, from which the following citations of laws are taken,

1638, c. 2. An act ordaining certain laws for the government of this province (limited to three years). The fourth section provides, "The inhabitants shall have all their rights and liberties according to the great charter of England."

In a list of bills twice read, and engrossed but never passed, is An act for the liberties of the people. "They are thus enumerated in the Bill, viz., all Christian inhabitants (slaves excepted) to have and enjoy all such rights, liberties, immunities, privileges and free customs, within this province, as any natural born subject of England hath or ought to have or enjoy in the realm of England, by force or virtue of the common law or statute law of England, saving in such cases as the same are or may be altered or changed by the laws and ordinances of this province, &c."

1641, c. 6. An act against Fugitives.-"This act (which made it felony of death, together with forfeiture of lands, goods, &c., for any apprentice servant to depart away secretly from his or her master or dame, with intent to convey him or herself away out of the province; and in any other person that should willingly accompany such servant in such unlawful departure, unless his Lordship or his Lieutenant-General should think proper to change such pains of death into a servitude not exceeding seven years, &c.), was superseded by the act of 1649, c. 5, which last was repealed by 1676, c. 7.

There are various acts and titles of acts, given in Bacon's laws, relating to servants, fugitives, runaways, and those that entertain them, servants that have bastards, &c. It is remarkable that these laws, and the early statutes respecting negro slaves, were enacted for short periods, usually three years, and were continued from time to time by re-enactments. Their provisions are so similar to those of Virginia, on the same subject, that it is not necessary to make a particular statement of them. The same collection contains numerous acts naturalizing,

on petition, persons of French, Dutch and Swedish surnames. The first statute relating to negro slaves, which in this collection is given in full, is that of 1715, c. 44. Others before that date are described by their titles only. The earliest law on the subject appears to have been that of

1663, c. 30. An act concerning negroes and other slaves, confirmed by 1676, c. 2. This is not given in Bacon's laws; as cited, Butler v. Boarman, 1 Harris & McHenry, 37,' it enacts, s. 1. "All negroes or other slaves within the province, and all negroes and other slaves to be hereafter imported into the province, shall serve durante vita; and all children born of any negro or other slave, shall be slaves as their fathers were for the term of their lives." Sec. 2. "And forasmuch as divers freeborn English women, forgetful of their free condition, and to the disgrace of our nation, do intermarry with negro slaves, by which also divers suits may arise, touching the issue of such women, and a great damage doth befall the master of such negroes, for preservation whereof for deterring such free-born women from such shameful matches, be it enacted, &c.: That whatsoever free-born woman shall intermarry with any slave, from and after the last day of the present assembly, shall serve the master of such slave during the life of her husband; and that all the issue of such free-born women, so married, shall be slaves as their fathers were." Sec. 3. "And be it further enacted, that all the issues of English, or other free-born women, that have already married negroes, shall serve the master of their parents, till they be thirty years of age and no longer."

1666, c. 22. An act against runaways and such as shall entertain them, extended, 1671, c. 19; rep. 1676, c. 2.

1669, c. 18. An act for preventing servants and criminal persons running out of this province.

1671, c. 2 An act encouraging the importation of negroes and slaves into this province, confirmed, 1676, c. 2: a new act 1692, c. 52.

1676, c. 7. An act relating to servants and slaves ;-for

1 On a claim for freedom 2 Harris & McHenry, 214.

by the descendants of Eleanor Butler in 1770, see also 1 Hildr. 568. Stroud's Sketch, &c., p. 15.