Appealing for Liberty: Freedom Suits in the South by Loren Schweninger (review)

Loren Schweninger's compelling study of freedom suits from the American Revolution to the Civil War makes a significant contribution to the legal history of American slavery. Previous scholars have explored the records of local courts both to understand the legal claims of enslaved people and to chart the changing attitudes of white people toward slavery. Their work has yielded important insights concerning how the law shaped slavery and society across different states and regions. No study, however, has presented the chronological and geographic complexity that Schweninger does in Appealing for Liberty. By compiling data for 2,023 freedom suits covering 4,601 plaintiffs from fifteen slave states as well as the District of Columbia from 1779 to 1863, Schweninger shows that across the South, enslaved people strategically used the courts to navigate an array of robust slave laws. This diverse collection of suits not only reveals the litigation strategies of lawyers and the variation in procedures that determined the outcomes of such cases but also illuminates the experiences of enslaved people who appear in the depositions and testimonies. We see the countless ways their lives shifted as they were sold, inherited, and rented, and how they preserved the memories of these often traumatic transitions. Finally, Schweninger reveals that even as the laws of slavery intensified, enslaved people throughout the South pursued legal recourse and that southern courts sometimes decided in favor of their liberty.

Going to court required the help of lawyers, the support of local witnesses, and a vivid memory of the details of the past. Enslaved people understood that filing a freedom suit marked the beginning of an unpredictable and often prolonged process. They also understood that their behavior and reputation would be under scrutiny. The legal culture of the South demanded that the plaintiff in freedom suits demonstrate evidence of "heroic deeds," "meritorious service" (35), or honorable character. Any act of resistance could work against them during court proceedings. Lawyers helped them navigate this terrain, while also scrutinizing available legal strategies as they prepared their arguments for court.

For the most part, Schweninger claims, the lawyers involved were not abolitionists but instead took an interest in freedom suits because of their commitment to the rule of law. Many of them, in fact, were slaveholders themselves who believed in the lawful practice of slavery. Any motivation beyond that placed their reputations at risk because they could be accused of aiding and abetting an unlawful evasion of slavery and be forced to face the ire of locals. Nevertheless, Schweninger shows that freedom suits were not possible without white lawyers, witnesses, and, in some states, a "Near Friend" or "next friend" (54)—usually a white person required to file on behalf of the enslaved person. Enslaved people employed as much help as possible as they faced the difficult task of furnishing proof that they were wrongfully held in bondage.

As Schweninger demonstrates, people illegally enslaved used several kinds of evidence to support their right to freedom. Sometimes they relied on wills and deeds; other times they demonstrated that they had been illegally imported from another state; or, lastly, they might show that they were descended from a free, white, or Native American woman. Proving this last claim could be most complicated. The legal doctrine of partus sequitir ventrem—"that which is brought forth follows the womb" (10)—meant that the status of a person of African descent was determined by the mother. In the absence of any documented record of the legal status of the person from whom the plaintiff claimed descent, courts admitted hearsay evidence. Maternal ancestry communicated by the enslaved offered critical evidence against the claims of white owners, despite the fact that most courts refused to recognize slave testimony against slaveholders. Women in particular were important interlocutors of the genealogies articulated in depositions and testimonies. In these oral histories, they recounted important dates, details, and places that helped lawyers retrace the steps of the enslaved...