CHAPTER XXII.

THE COLONY OF NORTH CAROLINA.

1669-1775.

THE GEOGRAPHICAL SITUATION OF NORTH CAROLINA FAVORABLE TO THE Slave-Trade. -THE LOCKE CONSTITUTION ADOPTED.- WILLIAM SAYLE COMMISSIONED GOVERNOR. LEGISLATIVE CAREER OF THE COLONY. THE INTRODUCTION OF THE ESTABLISHED CHURCH OF ENGLAND INTO THE COLONY. THE RIGHTS OF NEGROES CONTROLLED ABSOLUTELY BY THEIR MASTERS. AN ACT RESPECTING CONSPIRACIES. THE WRATH OF ILL-NATURED WHITES VISITED UPON THEIr Slaves. -AN ACT AGAINST THE EMANCIPATION OF SLAVES.-LIMITED RIGHTS OF FREE NEGROES.

HE geographical situation of North Carolina was favorable to the slave-trade.

TH

Through the genius of Shaftesbury, and the subtle cunning of John Locke, Carolina received, and for a time adopted, the most remarkable constitution ever submitted to any people in any age of the world. The whole affair was an insult to humanity, and in its fundamental elements bore the palpable evidences of the cruel conclusions of an exclusive philosophy. "No elective franchise could be conferred upon a freehold of less than fifty acres," while all executive power was vested in the proprietors themselves. Seven courts were controlled by fortytwo counsellors, twenty-eight of whom held their places through the gracious favor of the proprietary and "the nobility." Trial by jury was concluded by the opinions of the majority.

"The instinct of aristocracy dreads the moral power of a proprietary yeomanry; the perpetual degradation of the cultivators of the soil was enacted. The leet-men, or tenants, holding ten acres of land at a fixed rent, were not only destitute of political franchises, but were adscripts to the soil; 'under the jurisdiction of their lord, without appeal;' and it was added, 'all the children of leet-men shall be leet-men, and so to all generations.'":

I

The men who formed the rank and file of the yeomanry of the colony of North Carolina were ill prepared for a government

Bancroft, vol. ii. 5th ed. p. 148.

launched upon the immense scale of the Locke Constitution. The hopes and fears, the feuds and debates, the vexatious and insoluble problems, of the political science of government which had clouded the sky of the most astute and ambitous statesmen of Europe, were dumped into this remarkable instrument. The distance between the people and the nobility was sought to be made illimitable, and the right to govern was based upon permanent property conditions. Hereditary wealth was to go arm in arm with political power.

The constitution was signed on the 21st of July, 1669, and William Sayle was commissioned as governor. The legislative career of the Province began in the fall of the same year; and history must record that it was one of the most remarkable and startling North America ever witnessed. The portions of the constitution which refer to the institution of slavery are as follows:

"97th. But since the natives of that place, who will be concerned in our plantation, are utterly strangers to Christianity, whose idolatry, ignorance or mistake, gives us no right to expel or use them ill; and those who remove from other parts to plant there, will unavoidably be of different opinions, concerning matters of religion, the liberty whereof they will expect to have allowed them, and it will not be reasonable for us on this account to keep them out; that civil peace may be obtained amidst diversity of opinions, and our agreement and compact with all men, may be duly and faithfully observed; the violation whereof, upon what pretence soever, cannot be without great offence to Almighty God, and great scandal to the true religion which we profess; and also that Jews, Heathens and other dissenters from the purity of the Christian religion, may not be scared and kept at a distance from it, but by having an opportunity of acquainting themselves with the truth and reasonableness of its doctrines, and the peaceableness and inoffensiveness of its professors, may by good usage and persuasion, and all those convincing methods of gentleness and meekness, suitable to the rules and design of the gospel, be won over to embrace, and unfeignedly receive the truth; therefore any seven or more persons agreeing in any religion, shall constitute a church or profession, to which they shall give some name, to distinguish it from others. . . .

"IoIst. No person above seventeen years of age, shall have any benefit or protection of the law, or be capable of any place of profit or honor, who is not a member of some church or profession, having his name recorded in some one, and but one religious record, at once. . . .

"107th. Since charity obliges us to wish well to the souls of all men, and religion ought to alter nothing in any man's civil estate or right, it shall be lawful for slaves as well as others, to enter themselves and be of what church or profession any of them shall think best, and thereof be as fully members as any freemen. But yet no slave shall hereby be exempted from that civil dominion his master hath over him, but be in all things in the same state and condition he was in before. . . .

"110th. Every freeman of Carolina, shall have absolute power and authority over his negro slaves, of what opinion or religion soever." 1

Though the Locke Constitution was adopted by the proprietaries, March 1, 1669, it may be doubted whether it ever had the force of law, as it was never ratified by the local Legislature. Article one hundred and ten, granting absolute power and authority to a master over his Negro slave, is without a parallel in the legislation of the colonies. And while the slave might enter the Christian Church, and his humanity thereby be recognized, it was strangely inconsistent to place his life at the disposal of brutal masters, who "neither feared God nor regarded man."

The Negro slaves in North Carolina occupied the paradoxical position of being eligible to membership in the Christian Church, and the absolute property of their white brothers. In the second draught of the constitution, signed in March, 1670, against the eloquent protest of John Locke, the section on religion was amended so as, while tolerating every religious creed, to declare "the Church of England" the only true Orthodox Church, and the national religion of the Province. This, in the face of the fact that the great majority of all the Christians who flocked to the New World were dissenters, separatists, and nonconformists, can only be explained in the light of the burning zeal of the Church of England to out-Herod Herod, to carry the Negroes into the communion of the State church for political purposes. It was the most sordid motive that impelled the churchmen to open the church to the slave. His membership did not change his condition, nor secure him immunity from the barbarous treatment the institution of slavery bestowed upon its helpless victims.

In the eyes of the law the Negro, being absolute property, had no rights, except those temporarily delegated by the master; and he acted in the relation of an agent. Negro slaves were not allowed "to raise horses, cattle or hogs;" and if any stock were found in their possession six months after the passage of the Act of 1741, they were to be seized by the sheriff of the county, and sold by the church-wardens of the parish. The profits arising from such sales went, one half to the parish, the other half to the informer. A slave was not suffered to go off of the plantation where he was appointed to live, without a pass signed by his

1 Statutes of S. C., vol. i. pp. 53-55.

2 Public Acts of N. C., vol. i. p. 64.

master or the overseer. There was an exception made in the case of Negroes wearing liveries. Negro slaves were not allowed the use of fire-arms or other weapons, except they were armed with a certificate from their master granting the coveted permission. If they hunted with arms, not having a certificate, any Christian could apprehend them, seize the weapons, deliver the slave to the first justice of the peace; who was authorized to administer, without ceremony, twenty lashes upon his or her bare back, and send him or her home. The master had to pay the cost of arrest and punishment. The one exception to this law was, that one Negro on each plantation or in each district could carry a gun to shoot game for his master and protect stock, etc.; but his certificate was to be in his possession all the time. If a Negro went from the plantation on which he resided, to another plantation or place, he was required by statute to travel in the most generally frequented road. If caught in another road, not much travelled, except in the company of a white man, it was lawful for the man who owned the land through which he was passing to seize him, and administer not more than forty lashes. If Negroes visited each other in the night season, the only time they could visit, the ones who — were found on another plantation than their master's were punished with lashes on their naked back, not exceeding forty; while the Negroes who had furnished the entertainment received twenty lashes for their hospitality. In case any slave, who had not been properly fed and clothed by his master, was convicted of stealing cattle, hogs, or corn from another man, an action of trespass could be maintained against the master in the general or county court, and damages recovered.1

Here, as in the other colonies, the greatest enemy of the colonists was an accusing conscience. The people started at every breath of rumor, and always imagined their slaves conspiring to cut their throats. There was nothing in the observed character of the slaves to justify the wide-spread consternation that filled the public mind. Nor was there any occasion to warrant the passage of the Act of 1741, respecting conspiracies among slaves. It is a remarkable document, and is produced here.

"XLVII. And be it further enacted by the authority aforesaid, That if any number of negroes or other slaves, that is to say, three, or more, shall, at any

1 This is an instance of humanity in the North-Carolina code worthy of special note. It stands as the only instance of justice toward the over-worked and under-fed slaves of the colony.

time hereafter, consult, advise or conspire to rebel, or make insurrection, or shall plot or conspire the murder of any person or persons whatsoever, every such consulting, plotting or conspiring, shall be adjudged and deemed felony: and the slave or slaves convicted thereof, in manner herein after directed, shall suffer death.

"XLVIII. And be it further enacted by the authority aforesaid, That every slave committing such offence, or any other crime or misdemeanor, shall forthwith be committed, by any justice of the peace, to the common jail of the county within which the said offence shall be committed, there to be safely kept; and that the sheriff of such county, upon such commitment, shall forthwith certify the same to any Justice in the commission for the said court for the time being, resident in the county, who is thereupon required and directed to issue a summons for two or more Justices of the said court, and four freeholders, such as shall have slaves in the said county; which said three Justices and four freeholders, owners of slaves, are hereby impowered and required upon oath, to try all manner of crimes and offences, that shall be committed by any slave or slaves, at the court house of the county, and to take for evidence, the confession of the offender, the oath of one or more credible witnesses, or such testimony of negroes, mulattoes or Indians, bond or free, with pregnant circumstances, as to them shall seem convincing, without the solemnity of a jury; and the offender being then found guilty, to pass such judgment upon such offender, according to their discretion, as the nature of the crime or offence shall require; and on such judgment, to award execution.

"XLIX. Provided always, and be it enacted, That it shall and may be lawful for each and every Justice, being in the commission of the peace for the county where any slave or slaves shall be tried, by virtue of this act, (who is owner of slaves) to sit upon such trial, and act as a member of such court, though he or they be not summoned thereto : anything herein before contained to the contrary, in any wise, notwithstanding.

"L. And to the end such negro, mulatto or Indian, bond or free, not being christians, as shall hereafter be produced as an evidence on the trial of any slave or slaves, for capital or other crimes, may be under the greater obligation to declare the truth; Be it further enacted, There where any such negro, mulatto or Indian, bond or free, shall, upon due proof made, or pregnant circumstances, appearing before any county court within this government, be found to have given a false testimony, every such offender shall, without further trial, be ordered, by the said court, to have one ear nailed to the pillory, and there stand for the space of one hour, and the said ear to be cut off, and thereafter the other ear nailed in like manner, and cut off, at the expiration of one other hour; and moreover, to order every such offender thirty-nine lashes, well laid on, on his or her bare back, at the common whipping post.

"LI. And be it further enacted by the authority aforesaid, That at every such trial of slaves committing capital or other offences, the first person in commission sitting on such trial, shall, before the examination of every negro, mulatto or Indian, not being a christian, charge such to declare the truth.

"LII. Provided always, and it is hereby intended, That the master, owner or overseer of any slave, to be arraigned and tried by virtue of this act, may appear at the trial, and make what just defence he can for such slave or slaves;