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Act X Was Passed
This act pretty much state that Negros, free or not, are not allowed to wield guns. It was a minor thing at the time. So small it seems insignificant. If you were a Negro slave, you would most likely not be able to own a gun anyway. If you did it would be taken from you. If you were a free Negro, then, most likely, no one would sell you a gun because of things like that, the law seemed useless to most of the black men. The people who passed the law, wealthy white men, were scared of a revolt... -
Act X Was Passed (continued)
...from the enslaved Negros and that it could possibly end up like the Powhatan Massacre where very few of who was on the plantation survived.
This law felt insignificant to most of the Negros. It didn`t diminish them much, but this is only the start of the diminishing process. -
Period: to
The Diminshing Progress of Slaves Rights
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Court Case: Document A: Anthony Johnson(Nergro) takes a white man to court and wins.
In this court case Anthony Johnson, free Blackman, took a Whiteman to court and won. The court case was about a piece of land in Northampton County. Back then it was still possible for a Blackman to take a Whiteman to court and win. All of that was before slaves lost their rights and just became property. All of that was before any of the major diminishing progress of slaves. -
Act XII is passed
Act XII states that the position in society is of the mother not the father. This made a big difference in slave’s lives. Some plantation owners single or not, buy certain slaves for….. personal reasons. Now when those personal slaves had a baby, it was born into slavery instead of into freedom. This saved the plantation owner`s lots of money, but further more it diminished the slaves even more because now the slaves couldn`t even have free children if the child was born on a plant. -
Act IV is passed
This act says a black person cannot hold office in local or national government. All Black people who where in office were forced to pay a huge fine. Now the slaves had no representation in any type of government. Now the wealthy, White slave and plantation owners now decided what was "best" for their slaves. -
Act XXII is passed
This act says that all slaves are now considered property. This is the final part of the diminishing. Now the Black people were treated as property. They had almost no rights and were as high in society as the livestock. They had almost no chance of freedom and were not even counted an entire man. This was the final part of the diminishing progress.