State Slave Codes

Between the 1640s and the 1860s, an extensive body of laws was developed in the United States to regulate the institutions of slavery. The earliest codes were Virginia's, passed in 1705. Slave codes were laws enacted in each U.S. state that defined the relationship between slaves and slave owners. These laws codified the permanency of slavery, inherited through the mother, denying slaves all basic rights—citizenship, education, legal marriages, property assembly, and associating with each other. With the explosion of the slave trade between the 16th and 19th centuries, and the widespread establishment of the chattel system—which allowed for ownership of human beings and their descendants—certain laws were needed to allow for more authority and regulation of the slave population.

The fundamental objective of the slaveholding codes was to define slaves as human chattel. Slaves were considered property, and these laws established slaves as tangible personal property or goods. The laws provided that slaves would be treated as goods—sold, transferred, or pawned. These laws were used to codify that slaves had no status as human beings because they were defined as property—a common thread in many state codes. They defined slaves as property that had no power. Slave owners had absolute power over any slaves they owned. Most slave codes outlined which rights a slave did not have versus which rights slaves did have. A common feature among most state slave codes was that slaves did not possess any civil, religious, or political rights as outlined in different variation in the various state codes.

There were an estimated 4 million black Africans and people of African descent in slavery by 1860; these slaves resisted this system of labor exploitation through rebellions, noncompliance, and escaping to Canada and to other non–slave states. Fugitive slave laws were passed in 1793 and 1850 by the U.S. Congress as a means of managing slaves and dealing with the problems slave owners were encountering, particularly with regard to fugitive slaves.

Themes of the State Slave Codes

The various state slave codes outlined the legal relation between master and slave. The statutes [Page 1716]also made provision for punishment; slaves could be punished in any manner, including death, although some state codes did make provision against extreme punishment such as death, maiming, or mutilation. For example, Louisiana's code, passed in 1724, stated that punishment should not mutilate, disfigure, or kill the slave. Florida's code, passed in 1821, had similar provisions. The evidence suggests that these provisions were rarely adhered to. Codes were constantly being revised and tended to get harsher. Codes were also contradictory, as seen in the 1724 Louisiana code that mandated capital punishment for any slave who hit a white person.

An African American slave family posed in front of the Gaines house in the Virginia area circa 1861. Strict and harsh slave codes were passed in Virginia in 1705 and the rest of the south and the colonies followed suit. Common punishments included maiming, branding, placing slaves in stocks, and receiving 60 lashes for an offense as minor as robbery.

The statutes emphasized the domination of slave masters over slaves and the slave as personal chattel with no rights and in the same stead as animals or inanimate properties. This was consistent throughout all the state slave codes. Kentucky's slave code of 1798 defined slaves as property and stipulated that slaves could be passed down only to heirs and not to executors. Virginia's 1705 statute mandated that slaves could be used to pay a master's debts. Slaves were considered personal property, and this was highlighted even in statutes in what eventually came to be known as free states. For example, in the Maryland Act of 1798, slaves were classified as personal property in the same category as furniture, plates, books, working beasts, or animals. This was also seen in the New Jersey slave codes that referred to slaves as property, held with no higher regard than other properties.

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