U.
S. Women's Legal History
Virginia Laws of Servitude and Slavery From William Waller Hening, The Statutes at large: Being a Collection of all the Laws of Virginia, from the First Session of the Legislature in the Year 1619 (New York: R & W & G. Bartow, 1823). December 1662 - 14tth Charles II, 2:170, Act XII.
Negro womens children to serve according to the condition of the mother.
WHEREAS some doubts have arrisen whether children got by any Englishman
upon a negro woman should be slave or ffree, Be it therefore enacted and
declared by this present grand assembly, that all children borne in this
country shall be held bond or free only according to the condition of
the mother, And that if any christian shall committ ffornication with
a negro man or woman, hee or shee so offending shall pay double the ffines
imposed by the former act.
October 1705 - 4th Anne. Chap. KLIX. 3.447.
An act concerning Servants and Slaves.
. . .
XVIII. And if any women servant shall be delivered of a bastard child
within the time of her service aforesaid, Be it enacted, by the authority
aforesaid, and it is hereby enacted, That in recompence of the loss and
trouble occasioned her master or mistress thereby, she shall for every
such offence, serve her said master or owner one whole years after her
time by indenture, custom, and former order of court, shall be expired;
or pay her said master or owner, one thousand pounds of tobacco; and the
reputed father, if free, shall give security to the church-wardens of
the parish where that child shall be, to maintain the child, and keep
the parish indemnified; or be complelled thereto by order of the country
court, upon the said church-wardens complain: But if a servant, he shall
make satisfaction of the parish, for keeping the said child, after his
time by indenture, custom, or order of the county court, upon complaint
of the church wardens of the said parish, for the time being. And if any
woman servant shall be got with child by her master, neither the said
master, nor his executors administrators, nor assigns, shall have any
claim of service against her, for or by reason such child; but she shall,
when her time due to her said master, by indenture, custom or order of
court, shall be expired, be sold by the church-wardens, for the time being,
of the parsih wherein such child shall be born, for one year, or pay one
thousand pounds of tobacco; and the said one thousand pounds of tobacco,
or whatever she shall be sold for, shall be emploied, by the vestry, to
the use of the said parish. And if any woman servant shall have a bastard
child by a negro, or mulatto, over and above the years service due to
her master or owner, she shall immediately, upon the expiration of her
time to her then present master or owner, pay down to the church-wardens
of the parish wherein such child shall be born, for the use of the said
parish fifteen pounds current money of Virginia, or be by them sold for
five years to the use aforesaid: And if a free christian white woman shall
have such bastard child, by a negro, or mulatto, for every such offence,
she shall, within one month after her delivery of such bastard child,
pay to the church-wardens for the time being, of the parish wherein such
child shall be born, for the use of the said parish fifteen pounds current
money of Virginia, or be by them sold for five years to the use aforesaid:
And in both the said cases, the church-wardens shall bind the said child
to be a servant, until it shall be thirty one years of age.
XIX. And for a further prevention of that abominable mixture and spurious
issue, which hereafter may increase in this her majesty's colony and dominion,
as well by English, and other white men and women intermarrying with negros
or mulattos, as by their unlawful coition with them, Be it enacted, by
the authority aforesaid, and it is hereby enacted, That whatsoever English,
or other white man or woman, being free, shall intemarry with a negro
or mulatto man or woman, bond or free, shall, by judgment of the county
court, be committed to prison, and there remain, during the space of six
months, without bail or mainprize; and shall forfeit ten pounds current
money of Virginia, to the use of the parish, as aforesaid.
XX. And be it further enacted, That no minister of the church of England,
or other minister, or person whatsoever, within this colony and dominion,
shall hereafter wittingly presume to marry a white man with a negro or
mulatto woman; or to marry a white woman with a negro or mulatto man,
upon pain of forfeiting and paying, for every such marriage the sume of
ten thousand pounds of tobacco; one half to our soveriegn lady the Queen,
her heirs and successors, for and towards the support of the government,
and the contingent charges thereof; and the other half to the informer;
To be recovered, with costs, by action of debt, bill, plaint, or information,
in any court of record within this her majesty's colony and dominion,
wherein no essoin, protection, or wager of law, shall be allowed.
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