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Slave codes
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Slave codes
The slave codes were laws relating to slavery and enslaved people, specifically regarding the Atlantic slave trade and chattel slavery in the Americas.
Most slave codes were concerned with the rights and duties of free people in regards to enslaved people. Slave codes left a great deal unsaid, with much of the actual practice of slavery being a matter of traditions rather than formal law.
The primary colonial powers all had slightly different slave codes. French colonies, after 1685, had the Code Noir specifically for this purpose. The Spanish had some laws regarding slavery in Las Siete Partidas, a far older law that was not designed for the slave societies of the Americas. English colonies largely had their own local slave codes, mostly based on the codes of either the colonies of Barbados or Virginia.
In addition to these national and state- or colony-level slave codes, there were city ordinances and other local restrictions regarding enslaved people.
There are many similarities between the various slave codes. The most common elements are:
There was no central English slave code; each colony developed its own code, often with reference to Roman law and its treatment of the status of slaves. After the United States established independence in the American Revolutionary War of 1775–1783, the individual states ratified new constitutions, but their laws were generally a continuation of the laws those regions had maintained prior to that point, and their slave codes remained unchanged.[citation needed]
The first comprehensive slave-code in an English colony was established in Barbados, an island in the Caribbean, in 1661. Many other slave codes of the time are based directly on this model. Modifications of the Barbadian slave codes were put in place in the Colony of Jamaica in 1664, and were then greatly modified in 1684. The Jamaican codes of 1684 were copied by the colony of South Carolina, first in 1691, and then immediately following the Stono Rebellion, in 1740. The South Carolina slave-code served as the model for many other colonies in North America. In 1755, the colony of Georgia adopted the South Carolina slave code.
Virginia's slave codes were made in parallel to those in Barbados, with individual laws starting in 1667 and a comprehensive slave-code passed in 1705. In 1667, the Virginia House of Burgesses enacted a law which did not recognize the conversion of African Americans to Christianity despite a baptism. In 1669, Virginia enacted "An act about the casual killing of slaves" which declared that masters who killed slaves deemed resisting were exempt from felony charges. In 1670, they enacted a law prohibiting free Africans from purchasing servants who weren't also African. In 1680, Virginia passed Act X, which prohibited slaves from carrying weapons, leaving their owner's plantation without a certificate, or raising a hand against "Christians".
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Slave codes
The slave codes were laws relating to slavery and enslaved people, specifically regarding the Atlantic slave trade and chattel slavery in the Americas.
Most slave codes were concerned with the rights and duties of free people in regards to enslaved people. Slave codes left a great deal unsaid, with much of the actual practice of slavery being a matter of traditions rather than formal law.
The primary colonial powers all had slightly different slave codes. French colonies, after 1685, had the Code Noir specifically for this purpose. The Spanish had some laws regarding slavery in Las Siete Partidas, a far older law that was not designed for the slave societies of the Americas. English colonies largely had their own local slave codes, mostly based on the codes of either the colonies of Barbados or Virginia.
In addition to these national and state- or colony-level slave codes, there were city ordinances and other local restrictions regarding enslaved people.
There are many similarities between the various slave codes. The most common elements are:
There was no central English slave code; each colony developed its own code, often with reference to Roman law and its treatment of the status of slaves. After the United States established independence in the American Revolutionary War of 1775–1783, the individual states ratified new constitutions, but their laws were generally a continuation of the laws those regions had maintained prior to that point, and their slave codes remained unchanged.[citation needed]
The first comprehensive slave-code in an English colony was established in Barbados, an island in the Caribbean, in 1661. Many other slave codes of the time are based directly on this model. Modifications of the Barbadian slave codes were put in place in the Colony of Jamaica in 1664, and were then greatly modified in 1684. The Jamaican codes of 1684 were copied by the colony of South Carolina, first in 1691, and then immediately following the Stono Rebellion, in 1740. The South Carolina slave-code served as the model for many other colonies in North America. In 1755, the colony of Georgia adopted the South Carolina slave code.
Virginia's slave codes were made in parallel to those in Barbados, with individual laws starting in 1667 and a comprehensive slave-code passed in 1705. In 1667, the Virginia House of Burgesses enacted a law which did not recognize the conversion of African Americans to Christianity despite a baptism. In 1669, Virginia enacted "An act about the casual killing of slaves" which declared that masters who killed slaves deemed resisting were exempt from felony charges. In 1670, they enacted a law prohibiting free Africans from purchasing servants who weren't also African. In 1680, Virginia passed Act X, which prohibited slaves from carrying weapons, leaving their owner's plantation without a certificate, or raising a hand against "Christians".