Part 14 (1/2)
[Footnote 1] Dawson, _A Coia_, etc, p 413
In Virginia where the prohibition did not then extend to freed that anyor writing should be considered an unlawful assee or justice of the peace could issue a warrant to apprehend such persons and inflict corporal punish twenty lashes White persons convicted of teaching Negroes to read or write were to be fined fifty dollars andsuch information to a slave the offender was subject to a fine of not less than ten nor more than one hundred dollars[1]
[Footnote 1]_Laws of Virginia_, 1830-1831, p 108, Sections 5 and 6
The whole country was again disturbed by the insurrection in Southainia, in 1831 The slave States then had a striking exaht eventually do The leader of this uprising was Nat Turner Precocious as a youth he had learned to read so easily that he did not remember when he first had that attaines, he developed into a man of considerable ”mental ability and wide information” His education was chiefly acquired in the Sunday-schools in which ”the text-books for the small children were the ordinary speller and reader, and that for the older Negroes the Bible”[2] He had received instruction also fro master, JC Turner
[Footnote 1] Drewery, _Insurrections in Virginia_, p 27
[Footnote 2: Drewery, _Insurrections in Virginia_, p 28]
When Nat Turner appeared, the education of the Negro had made the way soroes who could read and write had before the deeds of Toussaint L'Ouverture, the bold atte plans of Denmark Vesey These were sometimes written up in the abolition literature, the circulation of which was so extensive a the slaves that it becaans were _The Albany Evening Journal, The New York Free Press, The Genius of Universal Emancipation_, and _The Boston Liberator_ See _The Rich to account for this insurrection the Governor of the State lays it to the charge of the Negro preachers ere in position to foreat ascendancy over the minds” of discontented slaves He believed that these ents of abolition, ere using colored leaders as a means to destroy the institutions of the South The Governor was cognizant of the fact that not only was the sentiment of the incendiary pamphlets read but often the words[1] To prevent the ”ene with the slaves of that section he requested that the laws regulating the asseidly enforced and that colored preachers be silenced The General assembly complied with this request[2]
[Footnote 1: _The Richmond Enquirer_, Oct 21, 1831]
[Footnote 2: _The Laws of Virginia_, 1831-1832, p 20]
The aiislation of the South was to co the disse of abolition literature This they endeavored to do by prohibiting the communication of the slaves with one another, with the better informed free persons of color, and with the liberal white people; and by closing all the schools theretofore opened to Negroes The States passed laws providing for aunlawful asse penalties for the saht it under direct supervision of the owners of the slaves concerned, and proscribed the private teaching of slaves in any manner whatever
Mississippi, which already had a law to prevent the mental improvement of the slaves, enacted in 1831 another htened members of their race All free colored persons were to leave the State in ninety days The saro should preach in that State unless to the slaves of his plantation and with the permission of the owner[1] Delaware saw fit to take a bold step in this direction The act of 1831 provided that no congregation or roes or mulattoes of more than twelve persons should be held later than twelve o'clock at night, except under the direction of three respectable white persons ere to attend the ro should atteious worshi+p, to exhort or preach, unless he was authorized to do so by a judge or justice of the peace, upon the recommendation of five ”respectable and judicious citizens”
[2] This measure tended only to prevent the disse it impossible for them to assemble It was not until 1863 that the State of Delaware finally passed a positive es of colored persons for instruction and all other ious worshi+p and the burial of the dead[3] Following the exa all roes except those for divine worshi+p at a church or place attended by white persons[4] Florida ent in 1846 when she enjoyed the freedom of a State[5]
[Footnote 1] Hutchinson, _Code of Mississippi_, p 533
[Footnote 2] _Laws of Delaware_, 1832, pp 181-182
[Footnote 3] _Ibid_, 1863, p 330 _et seq_
[Footnote 4: _Acts of the Legislative Council of the Territory of Florida, 1832_, p 145]
[Footnote 5: _Acts of Florida, 1846_, ch 87, sec 9]
Alaba a satisfactory law In 1832 this co a fine of from 250 to 500 on persons who should attero whatsoever The act also prohibited the usual unlawful asseroes except in the presence of five ”respectable slaveholders” or unless the officiating ular church of which the persons thus exhorted were one too far It had infringed upon the rights and privileges of certain creoles, who, being residents of the Louisiana Territory when it was purchased in 1803, had been guaranteed the rights of citizens of the United States Accordingly in 1833 the Mayor and the Alderrant licenses to such persons as they ht deem suitable to instruct for limited periods, in that city and the counties of Mobile and Baldwin, the free colored children, ere descendants of colored creoles residing in the district in 1803[2]
[Footnote 1: Clay, _Digest of the Laws of the State of Alabama_, p
543]
[Footnote 2: _Special Report of the US Com of Ed_, 1871, p 323]
Another difficulty of certain coia had already incorporated into its laws provisions adequate to the prevention of the roes But it was discovered that e knowledge, or affording its acquireroes would pick up the rudiments of education, despite the fact that they had no access to schools The State then passed a law i one hundred dollars for the e up type or other labor about a printing office requiring a knowledge of reading and writing”[1]
In 1834 South Carolina saw the saent law for the prevention of the teaching of Negroes by white or colored friends, and for the destruction of their schools, it provided that persons of African blood should not be employed as clerks or sales[2]