Reconsidering the Enforcement of Virginia’s 1806 Law Banishing Emancipated People of Color

Vollständiger Abstract

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Abstract: Between 1806 and 1827 local Overseers of the Poor in Virginia were empowered to seize freed people of color who had been emancipated after May 1, 1806 but who had failed to leave the state within a year. The Overseers were to sell them as slaves. Although the existence of the 1806 law has been widely reported by scholars, many have downplayed the enforcement and impact of the law, and none have dwelled on the discretion the law allowed the Overseers in its enforcement. Nor have historians explored how and why the Overseers of the Poor were stripped of their authority to enforce the measure. Building on a speculation by Eva Sheppard Wolf that there might have been a connection between incidents in Accomack County arising from attempts to enforce the law and the statutory changes of 1827, this essay explores the initial inaction and the efforts to enforce the law in Accomack including the prosecution of James Outten, his defense by Abel P. Upshur and the latter’s role in changing the law in 1827. It also provides a brief reprise of the place of parish officials in enforcing early efforts to rid Virginia of emancipated individuals, the subsequent efforts to limit emancipations, the struggles through legislative petitions to remain after the legislation of 1806, and the consequences of the change in law after 1827.