William Murray, 1st Earl of Mansfield
Somersett's Case

Mansfield is best known for his judgment in Somersett's Case on the legality of keeping slaves in England. The English had been involved in the slave trade since 1553, and by 1768, ships registered in Liverpool, Bristol and London carried more than half the slaves shipped in the world. James Somersett was a slave owned by Charles Stewart, an American customs officer who sailed to Britain for business, landing on 10 November 1769. A few days later Somersett attempted to escape. He was recaptured in November and imprisoned on the ship Ann and Mary, owned by Captain John Knowles and bound for the British colony of Jamaica. Stewart intended to sell him there. However, three people claiming to be Somersett's godparents, John Marlow, Thomas Walkin and Elizabeth Cade, made an application before the Court of King's Bench for a writ of habeas corpus, and Captain Knowles was ordered to produce Somersett before the Court of King's Bench, which would determine whether his imprisonment was legal.

Mansfield ordered a hearing for 22 January 1772. Following an adjournment, the case was not heard until 7 February 1772. In the meantime, the case had attracted a great deal of attention in the press, and members of the public were forthcoming with donations to fund lawyers for both sides of the argument. An activist layman, Granville Sharp, who continually sought test cases against the legal justifications for slavery, was Somersett's real backer. When the case was heard, no fewer than five advocates appeared for the slave, speaking at three separate hearings between February and May. These lawyers included William Davy SL, John Glynn SL, James Mansfield and Francis Hargrave, who was later to become a noted barrister based on his work in this case. Charles Stewart was represented by John Dunning and James Wallace.

On behalf of Somersett, it was argued that while colonial laws might permit slavery, neither the common law of England, nor any law made by Parliament recognised the existence of slavery, and slavery was therefore illegal. Moreover, English contract law did not allow for any person to enslave himself, nor could any contract be binding without the person's consent. The arguments thus focused on legal details rather than humanitarian principles. A law passed in 1765 said that all lands, forts and slaves owned by the Africa Company were a property of the Crown, which could be interpreted to mean that the Crown accepted slavery. When the two lawyers for Charles Stewart put their case, they argued that a contract for the sale of a slave was recognised in England, and therefore the existence of slaves must be legally valid.

After the attorneys for both sides had given their arguments, Mansfield called a recess, saying that " required... consultation... among the twelve Judges". Finally, on 22 June 1772 Mansfield gave his judgment, which ruled that a master could not carry his slave out of England by force, and concluded:

The state of slavery is of such a nature, that it is incapable of being introduced on any reasons, moral or political; but only positive law, which preserves its force long after the reasons, occasion, and time itself from whence it was created, is erased from memory: it's so odious, that nothing can be suffered to support it, but positive law. Whatever inconveniences, therefore, may follow from a decision, I cannot say this case is allowed or approved by the law of England; and therefore the black must be discharged.

The ruling, alongside criticising slavery, also conclusively established that there was no legal status of slave in either parliamentary legislation or the common law. This did not effect slavery in the British Empire which would not be done until the passage of the 1833 Slavery Abolition Act through Parliament. As a result of the reporting of Mansfield's decision, public opinion and some newspapers gave the impression that slavery had been abolished in England by the ruling. Some historians believe that between 14,000 and 15,000 slaves were immediately freed in England, some of whom remained with their masters as paid or unpaid employees. However, it is questionable whether that many black people lived in England at the time, and those who did were mostly free already. Despite the ruling, Black Britons were occasionally kidnapped in the streets of London, Liverpool and Bristol and forcibly brought back to the colonies.(Such an incident was recounted by Olaudah Equiano in 1774 in his autobiography, An Interesting Narrative (1789).)

Contemporary reports suggested that Mansfield's personal experience with raising Dido Belle influenced his decision.
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