People Without Rights

Andrew Fede

First published in September 1992, the book traces the nature and development of the fundamental legal relationships among slaves, masters, and third parties. It shows how the colonial and antebellum Southern judges and legislators accommodated slavery's social relationships into the common law, and how slave law evolved in different states over time in response to social political, economic, and intellectual developments.

1. "The Law as to him is only a Compact between his Rulers," An Interpretation 2. The Legitimizing Role of Law in Slave Society 3. Accommodating Slavery into the Common Law 4. The Non-Legal Background to Three Trends in Antebellum Slave Law 5. The Changing Scope of White Liability for Slave Killing 6. The Changing Scope of White Liability for Non-Fatal Slave Abuse 7. Preventing Slaves from Being a Public Nuisance: Limits on his Master's Rights to Starve and Free his Slaves 8. Slave Criminals and Protection of his Master's Property Rights in Slaves: The Discrimination in the Substantive Law 9. Slave Criminals and Protection of his Master's Property Rights in Slaves: What Process was Due? 10. The Recognition of Slave Humanity to Settle the Rights of Whites that were Embodied in Slaves 11. The Impotence of Slave Humanity as an Impediment to the Separation of Slave Families 12. Conclusion: The Reification of Humanity