Pro-Slavery v. Anti-Slavery

In the case, State v. Mann the defendant John Mann had been charged with assault and battery in North Carolina. In 1829, Elizabeth Jones owned a slave named Lydia and sold her to John Mann for a year. During the course of the year, Lydia was unhappy with the arrangement and at some point Mann decided to punish Lydia by possibly whipping her. Lydia ended up escaping during the punishment and started to run away while Mann ordered her to stop. She continued to run and Mann claimed that after she disobeyed him, he then shot her and wounded her.

The local grand Jury took the unusual step of indicting Mann for assault and battery against a slave. During the trial, the Judge told the Jury that if it was believed that the punishment was "cruel and unwarrantable, and disproportionate to the offense committed by the slave that, in the law the Defendant was guilty," especially because he was not her owner.The Jury came to the verdict that Mann was guilty then, he appealed to the Supreme Court of North Carolina.

Thomas Ruffin was the chief justice of that court and he disliked the idea of slavery and was alarmed that a white man had used such violence against a black woman. Ruffin had no choice but to side with the law despite of his beliefs of the evils of slavery. Judge Ruffin had to put his own opinions aside and said, "The court is compelled to express an opinion upon the extent of the dominion of the master over the slave in North Carolina." Ruffin then observed that although Mann did not own Lydia, and that Elizabeth Jones might be able to sue him for damaging her property, he still had the right to use as much force needed to control Lydia as Elizabeth Jones would have used, since Lydia was legally under his control.

Keep in mind that in the two decades leading to the Civil War, that state's Supreme Court produced one of the most scandalous pro-slavery opinions in American History. Even though slavery was perfectly legal and constitutional, North Carolina had fewer slaves than most other states in the future Confederacy. This case highlighted the tension between law and justice, and the fact that more people were starting to notice that slavery was wrong, and inhumane.

Source: http://www.law.unc.edu/calendar/event.aspx?cid=635

Judge Thomas Ruffin