State v Mann Case

 

State v Mann

At the point when we ponder the past and the racial occasions that have happened, servitude is the thing that the vast majority of us American's see as the start of the beginning of racial contrasts in America. There are many legal disputes that prepared for opportunities for such countless individuals in this country. Fight v. Mann was a case that affected how the United States planned to work and had a major impact on cases later on.

 

This week in "Talking About Freedom" the class participated in a mock trial for the John Mann case; Part of the class represented opinions of the state and another portion of the class represented the defense for John Mann. For those of you that do not know what this case is, below is a brief summary of what the case is about. 

 

The John Mann Case-1829: John Mann was from North Carolina and had rented a female slave, named Lydia to use for a year. Lydia was disobedient and received a beating from Mann; she decided to run in the middle of the punishment. When she began to run Mann warned her that if she did not stop running, he would shoot her. Lydia continued to run and Mann shot her in the back. Although Lydia was not killed, she was injured and rendered useless as a slave. The court system fined Mann $10 (1800' s currency) yet he felt that he should not even have received a fine at all.

My team had to argue from one of the six modes of argumentation (religion, economic, ethical, political, historical, and legal) and defend the State in the State v. Mann case. I picked to view it from a historical perspective. Slavery was legal in North Carolina until January 1^st,1863. By the 1860s, By 1860,s the number of slaves in the state was over 330,000, about one-third of the total population.

 

In the Mann decision, Ruffin stated, “we are forbidden to enter upon a train of general reasoning on the subject. We cannot allow the right of the master to be rought into the discussion in the courts of justice.” (Item 44). This reasoning ignores the ruling in the previously mentioned State v. Hale decision in 1823, in which the court “upheld battery by a stranger against a slave as an indictable offense.” (Wynn 2009, 995)

 

In this case, State v. Hales in 1823, it took place at North Carolina Supreme Court. The indictment, in this case, is for an inhuman assault and battery, but the special verdict states, that Defendant struck the slave. The question, therefore, presented to the Court, is, whether a battery, committed on a slave, no justification, or circumstances attending it, being valid, is an indictable offense. There is an indictment on Defendant for committing an assault on a slave, and inhumanly beating, and wounding the slave. 

The case presided over the indictment, or prosecution, of a man who had committed cruel and heavy-handed punishment on his own slave. Hale was fined and found guilty due to being too aggressive to his slave. The State V. Hale case set a precedent for the State V. Mann case, that the harm of a slave is indictable, or punishable by law. If the assault of a slave has been punishable and found guilty previously, it should still be found punishable in this case. If the slave was considered "property", if you return a slave "broken", you are distracting property.