Case ID: tenn_22/html/0203-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Green, J.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Britain vs. The State.
    1. If a maslcr cause and permit his slaves to pass about in public view and observation indecently naked, he is guilty of lewdness and indictable therefor.
    2. It is not necessary that it be proved that the slave did exhibit him or herself in such state of nakedness by any command of the master, to sustain the indictment. That the master caused and permitted it, may be inferred from circumstances satisfactory to the mind of the jury.
    The grand jury of Claiborne county, at the September term, 1840, at the instance of Bryant Baker, prosecutor, indicted Levi Britain for lewdness.
    ’ This indictment charged that on the 1st day of August, 1840, and on divers other days, in the county of Claiborne, “Levi Britain, was and still is the owner of certain slaves, and was hound toi have and keep said slaves so clad and covered, as to prevent those parts of the persons of said slaves, as by the rules of decency should be kept hid and concealed from the public view, properly clothed and concealed from public view and observation;” and “tliat the said Levi Britain at &c. &c. being a lewd, licentious and immoral person, and not regarding tbe laws of decency did unlawfully commit open and notorious lewdness by then and there unlawfully, obscenely and of purpose causing and permitting his said slaves to go about in said county, so naked and destitute of clothing, that their organs of generation and other parts of their bodies, which should have been clothed and concealed, were publicly exposed to the view and observation of all the good people of the State.”
    The defendant pleaded not guilty, and an issue upon this plea was submitted to a jury of Claiborne county, at the January term, 1842, judge Lucky presiding. Proof was exhibited that the slave was seen on various occasions whilst in the employment and service of her master, almost entirely destitute of clothing, with some tattered rags hanging upon her, and her body exposed indecently as set forth iii the indictment. His honor charged the jury that the facts set forth in the indictment constituted an indictable offence, and that if the proof sustained the indictment, they would find the defendant guilty.
    The jury returned a verdict of guilty. A motion was made for a new trial and overruled, also in arrest of judgment which was also overruled and judgment rendered against the defendant, that he pay a fine of $25 and cost, &c. The defendant appealed in error.
    
      J. A. McKinney, for plaintiff in error.
    
      Attorney General, for the State.
   Green, J.

delivered the opinion of the court.

In this case, it is not questioned that if the defendant caused and permitted his slaves to go about the country in such a state of nakedness, as is alledged in the indictment, he is guilty of lewdness, andought to be punished; but it is insisted that the evidence does not support the indictment. It is true that the witnesses do not prove that the defendant, by any act or command of his, required the female slave to exhibit herself so destitute of clothes, as she is described by the witnesses to have been; but as she was seen upon several occasions in this state of nakedness, and other times with garments greatly tattered and torn, it might be inferred by the jury, that the master withheld from her the clothing necessary to cover her, and if so, by requiring her to perform labor for him in the field, he caused her to go about in this naked condition. If she had been entirely stripped, it would have been more probable that the act was voluntary on her part, but as she had dirty rags, the remains of garments, banging about her, and was frequently seen in this situation, we cannot say the jury did wrong in finding that her master caused and permitted the existence of these facts.

Let the judgment be affirmed,