Case ID: dc_3/html/0425-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Pipsico, a free mulatto, v. Bontz et al., white men.
    If work and labor be done according to special agreement, the plaintiff may recover upon a general indebitatus assumpsit.
    
    In Alexandria, a colored man is not a competent witness for or against a white man.
    Indebitatus assumpsit for work and labor.
    The plaintiff offered evidence of a special agreement for $100 a year, and that the service was performed according to the agreement.
    The defendant’s counsel objected, that there was no count upon the special agreement.
    
      Mr. Taylor and Mr. Neale, for the plaintiff. Mr. Hooe and Mr. Hewitt, for the defendants.
   The Court overruled the objection on the authority of the Bank of Columbia v. Patterson, 7 Cranch, 299.

The defendants’ counsel offered a free mulatto as a witness for the defendants.

Mr. Taylor, for the plaintiff, objected; and cited the Virginia laws, Rev. Co. 187, December 17,1792, c. 103, § 5, that “ no negro or mulatto shall be a witness, except in pleas of the commonwealth against negroes or mulattoes; or in civil pleas where negroes or mulattoes alone shall be parties.” The Court rejected the witness.

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