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The Virginia Slave Codes of 1705 (formally entitled An act concerning Servants and Slaves), were a series of laws enacted by the Colony of Virginia's House of Burgesses in 1705 regulating the interactions between slaves and citizens of the crown colony of Virginia. The enactment of the Slave Codes is considered to be the consolidation of ...
Slaves from Virginia escaped via waterways and overland to free states in the North, some being aided by people who lived along the Underground Railroad, which was maintained by both whites and blacks. [106] Although there were a number of measures to control enslaved people, there were still many that ran away.
Virginia established a law that no one could be enslaved in the state other than those who had that status on October 17, 1785, "and the descendants of the females of them." Kentucky adopted this law in 1798; Mississippi passed a similar law in 1822, using the phrase about females and their descendants, as did Florida in 1828. [ 12 ]
The United States experienced divisions between slave states in the South and free states in the North. At the start of the American Civil War in 1861, there were 34 states in the United States, 15 of which were slave states, all of which had slave codes. The 19 free states did not have slave codes, although they still had laws regarding ...
There were no laws regarding slavery early in Virginia's history, but, in 1640, a Virginia court sentenced John Punch, an African, to life in servitude after he attempted to flee his service. [121] The two whites with whom he fled were sentenced only to an additional year of their indenture, and three years' service to the colony. [122]
In the United States before 1865, a slave state was a state in which slavery and the internal or domestic slave trade were legal, while a free state was one in which they were prohibited. Between 1812 and 1850, it was considered by the slave states to be politically imperative that the number of free states not exceed the number of slave states ...
They were still considered to be indentured servants, like the approximately 4000 white indentured people, since a slave law was not passed in the colony until 1661. [ 3 ] [ 4 ] At the turn of the century, an increase in the Atlantic slave trade enabled planters to purchase enslaved labor, in lieu of bonded labor (indentured servants and ...
The vote was in favor of a new state—West Virginia—which was distinct from the Pierpont government, which persisted until the end of the war. [122] Congress and Lincoln approved, and, after providing for gradual emancipation of slaves in the new state constitution, West Virginia became the 35th state on June 20, 1863.