Racial #History
On this day Oct 20, 1669
Colonial Virginia Authorizes Enslavers to Kill Enslaved People Who Resisted
On October 20, 1669, the Virginia Colonial Assembly enacted a law that removed criminal penalties for enslavers who killed enslaved people resisting authority. The assembly justified the law on the grounds that โthe obstinacy of many [enslaved people] cannot be suppressed by other than violent means.โ
The law provided that an enslaver's killing of an enslaved person could not constitute murder because the โpremeditated maliceโ element of murder could not be formed against oneโs own property.
In subsequent years, Virginia continued to reduce legal protections for enslaved people. In 1723, the assembly removed all penalties for the killing of enslaved people during โcorrection,โ meaning that an enslaved person could be killed for an โoffenseโ as minor as picking bad tobacco.
The willful or malicious killing of an enslaved person could constitute murder, in theory, but the law excused the killing of an enslaved person if the killing was in any way provoked. In effect, enslavers could kill enslaved people with impunity in colonial-era Virginia, and the situation was similar in most other colonial territories.
Following the American Revolution, many states created penalties for killing enslaved peopleโbut the loophole permitting the killing of an enslaved person during โcorrectionโ or to prevent โresistanceโ remained. As a result, throughout the course of slavery in this country's history, enslavers were rarely punished for killing enslaved people.