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American Slavery and the Path of the Law

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 January 2016

Jenny B. Wahl
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Extract

There is some soul of goodness in things evil,

Would men observingly distill it out.

— Shakespeare, Henry V

Federal and state appellate court reporters for the 15 American slave states and the District of Columbia contain nearly 11,000 cases concerning slaves. In deciding these cases, southern judges formulated doctrines that would later become commonplace in other disputes. In fact, the common law of slavery, whether it concerned the sale, hiring, or accidental injury of a slave, looks far more like modern-day law than like antebellum law. Slave law, in many ways, helped blaze the path of American law generally.

Type
Articles
Information
Social Science History , Volume 20 , Issue 2 , Summer 1996 , pp. 281 - 316
Copyright
Copyright © Social Science History Association 1996 

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