Case ID: scl_20/html/0617-02.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Johnson, J.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

The State v. Wm. Elliott.
    
      Tried before Mr. Justice Evans, at Colleton, Spring Term, 1835.
    According- to «évery owno?Jor a settled planta. tioo, ¡hail om-ploy vrvikcep rm some whitomSS formin® °fpffi duty;” “an<i the satisfied by the ofF a "plantation hls"performance <íf patrol mduty sldee’atfanother placo.
    
      The defendant was indicted under the act of 1819, for not employing and keeping on his plantation called Social Hall, a white man capable of performing patrol'duty, for the years and 1831. Social Hall and another plantation called the Bluff, which Mrs. Smith, the mother-in-law of the defendant, cult‘vate^> formed a large body of land in which the defendant and Mrs. Smith had a common interest: the settlements, howev* er, were distinct, and about a mile and a half apart, but en c^osec^ within tho same enclosure without any division fence, In 1830 the defendant employed one Chancel as his overseer, wh°j by the contract, was to live at Social Hall, but the house out °f repair, he occupied a house at the Bluff whilst the other Was repairing ; but his sole business was at Social Hall, to which he was about to remove, when he died in May, 1830. From his death to the end of the year, no person lived at Social Hall ; a connexion of Chancel’s had the superintendance the plantation, and performed patrol duty there for the rest of the year. In 1831, Social Hall was under the super-*ntendance of one Hern as an overseer, who resided at the Bluff, and also overlooked that and another plantation. He visited Social Hall twice a day, and was bound by his contract to perform patrol duty there. Mrs. Chancel resided there a part of the year, and an overseer of another plantation four or five miles off lived with her, but he had no authority there.
    The presiding judge charged the jury that the defendant was not liable during the time Chancel lived, whose absence from the plantation was merely temporary; that the plantations at Social Hall and the Bluff, although parts of the same tract of land, were separate and distinct, and owned and cultivated by different persons, and the provisions of the act could not be satisfied by the residence of an overseer at one place to superintend the other, the intention of the legislature being to require some white person capable of performing patrol duty, to live on the plantation.
    The jury found the defendant guilty for six months in 1830, and the whole of 1831. The defendant appealed and now moves for a new trial.
   Johnson, J.

The act of 1819, out of which this prosecution arises, is a part of the system of police adopted for the govern, ment of our slaves, and the object indicated, as well by the terms used as the general policy of the system, ivas to secure to every plantation whereon slaves live and are employed, some white man to discharge patrol duty, and to act, at least, as a spy upon their conduct; and the terms of the act are imperative, “ that every owner of a settled plantation shall employ and keep on said plantation, some white man capable of performing patrol duty,” and whether the letter or spirit of the act is adopted in the construction, there is no doubt about its application here. The plantation or settlement of the defendant,, at Social Hall, was separate and distinct from that of Mrs. Smith at the Bluff, for although they had a common legal interest on both, the enjoyment and use were several, as much so as if there had been no community of interest, and employing and keeping a white man at one, does not conform to either the letter or the spirit of the act.

The case of The State v. Blythe, 3 M’C. 363, relied on by the counsel for the motion, is not analogous. There the defendant’s residence was only separated from her plantation by a street, and its contiguity to the place where the slaves resided, was supposed to be such as to enable her to exercise that control and supervision over them which was contemplated by the act; but in this case there were two distinct negto settlements, owned or possessed by different individuals.

Motion dismissed.

O’Neall and Hakpeb, Js. concurred.