slavery debate

As Mr. Adams previously stated we must not confuse property and actual people. In his own words, the slave was nothing more than property worthy of her owner being repaired for lack of value. He even so kindly outlined how much value she had lost, telling me how someone with a set value could be anything other than property. As I stand here in front of you all to defend my client Mr. John Mann who simply only did only what he knew to do

My client’s actions were nowhere near out of the wrong in fact Mr. Mann was completely in line with the normality of how to handle a runaway slave.

When situations like the present are presented before a judge cannot help but feel sorrow for Ms. Lydia. The facts indicate a different situation, though. In this case, the defendant had hired and was in possession of the slave, and the battery occurred while the slave was being hired. No rule now in place is intended to interfere with the responsibilities of the hirer to the general owner for an injury that permanently reduces the worth of the slave. As Ella mentioned in her speech and I quote “We recognize that Lydia wasn’t owned by Mann with that being said Lydia was running away and was not a threat to Mann or anyone else because of this we find that the acts of Mann were excessive, immoral, and unnecessary.” if he didn’t own her why did he have to pay to rent her. I wanna share this quote of mine with you “the power of the master must be absolute”. Let me repeat that for everyone in the room one more time. (repeat quote). Mr. Mann showed his absolute power to Lydia when she decided to try and run and while the consequences of her actions in an outsider’s eyes can be seen as brutal Mr. Mann had no other choice but to shoot her.

https://northcarolinahistory.org/encyclopedia/state-v-mann/