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Introduction and summary.

Letter text, 4 July 1776

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Virginia:

In the High Court of Chancery March 16, 1798

Between Robert Pleasants, son and heir of Jon Plesaeants, deed. Pltf.

Mary Logan, widow and administratix of Charles Logan, and divisee of John Pleasants and Jonathan Pleasants, deceased,Elizabeth Pleasants, administratix of Joseph Pleasants, deceased,Isaac Pleasants and Jane his wife, Samuel Pleasants, junior, Thomas Pleasants, junior, and Margaret his wife, Robert Langley and Elizabeth his wife, Daniel Teasdale and Margaret his wife, late Margaret Langley, Elizabeth Langley the younger, and Anne May,

On the ***(motion?) of the Plaintiff by his counsel, the court doth order that the Defendants, who are in possession of any slaves that are the subject of concovery*** between the parties in this suit, do not carry or remove them, or cause them, or any of them, to be carried or removed out of the commonwealth during the pendency of this suit, or until the further order of the court.

June 7, 1798 On the motion of Daniel Teasdale by his counsel, leave is given him to amend his answer, whereupon he filed the same. September the 12th, 1798

Between Robert Pleasants, son and heir of John Pleasants, Pltf. And Cary Pleasants and Mary Pleasants his wife, late Mary Logan, administratrix of Charles Logan, and divisee of John Pleasants and Jonathan Pleasants, Dec'd and others. Deft. And between Ned, a pauper, *** And Elizabeth Pleasants, Deft. In these causes, which came on last term to be heard the bills(?), demurrers and asnwers, and on the testaments of John Pleasants

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and Jonathan Pleasants, and the Joural of the House of Delegates, exhibited and read, and were argued by counsel, the court on this twelfth day of September, in the year of our lord one thousand seven hundred and ninety eight, overruled the demurrers, because the right to freedom proposed to be asserted by the plaintiff on behalf of certain men, women and children detained in slavery, which freedom the former owner of some of them and of the progenitors of others could not bestow, altough solicitous to bestow it, during his life time, was, preserved, if it could be preserved, until enjoyment of the bless would be permitted by temporary and conditional bequests of the slaves, with a confidence that in an event which might remove the legal obstacle to deliverance from the hr***ldom. the legataries would fulfil the testator's desire, so that the intermediate possession of the legataries, if that desire were not inane(???) was ficuiary, & in suhc a case, the elements, from which juridical(???) arrangements commence, prove the question which hath occured to be peculiarly proper for praetorian animadversion for decision before a tribunal erected especially to foster and effectuate conscientious fideicommissa: and upon that question which is the capital subject of disceptatin and some others in consequence thereof the court declared its opinion in these terms, the condition which the testator, John Pleasants, enjoined the legataries, and which, if it were lawful, excepting the bequest they were obliged implicitly to perform, was not contrary to law. Such a provision for emancipation was not prohivted literally by the statute in 1748, the only instituted law then extant, which can be quoted for that purpose, enacting "that no slave shall be set free, "upon an pretence, except for services to be adjudged by the governor "and council to be meritorious," the statute operated only upon emancipations efficatious immediately, not those of which the efficacy was fortuitous; and ampliation of the statute giving it energy in cases of which similar predicaments might seem to require similar policy, is reprobated in this instance, where the defendants, in a court of equity, are invoking its aid to hinder the restitution of a right, of which they, on whose behalf it is claimed, and their progenitors, could not have been deprived without violation of equitable constitutional principles. An objection urged by one of the counsel for the defendants, if it were not misunderstood, namely, that John Pleasants, who dying before the statute permitted manumission of slaves, enacted in the year 1782, was never authorised to manumit his slaves, could not enjoy manumission of them in any circumstances, is founded upon a position conceived not to be true, unless the act required by the condition to be performed were a malum in se; that a condition requiring performance of an act, not whilst the performance would be unlawful,

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but when it would, if ever it should be lawful, that such a condition to be performed, not after an intolerable lenght of time, is unlawful seems an absurd positionl upon the doctrine of perpetuities, if applicable to any cases, in which human liberty is challenged, can not be found an objection against the slaves existing at the death of the testator, John Pleasants, or against the slaves born after, of mothers exisiting before his death; for their cases are examples of the legitimate periods, during which emergence or lapse of contingent dispositions may be suspended, namely, where events before the termination of a life or lives existent, or of a life or lives immediately succeeding hte existent, must fix the destiny. Here the slaves for whose benefit the testator intended the bequests are first, those of whom he was POSSESSED at the time of his death, and secondly, those of whose MOTHERS he was so possessed. The period of time during ability of the slaves to enjoy when the legislature should permit them to enjoy this benefit was suspended, did not exced the tolerated period. I was during the lives of them, who survived the testator, and of them who were born after his death, of mothers surviving him, sothat, in equity, of the slaves, on whose behalf this prosecution was instituted, they who were thirty years old or older, in the year one thousand seven hundred and eighty two, when the statute authorising manumission was enacted, were, at that time entitlted, they, who born before his death are not yet thirty years old, will be when they shall attain that age, intitled to freedom, they who were born between the times of the said testator's death and of enacting the said statute will be when they shall attain the same age intitled to freedom, and they who have been born since the said statute was enacted, were at their birth entitled to freedom; and the plaintiff not only the heir but the surviving executor of the said John Pleasants, is the proper party to dindicate the that freedom, and require fulfilment of his desire repeatedly declared in his testament, and the court doth direct one of the commissioners thereof to report a catalogue of the slaves aforesaid, distinguishing the times when, according to the foregoing opinion, any of them ought therefore to have been and hereafter to be liberated from servitude, and stating accounts of profits, to which they who have been wronfulyl detained are intitled. September 26th, 1798 The Defendants Cary Pleasants and MAry his wife, late Mary Logan, administratix of Charles Logan, and devisee of John Pleasantt's and Jonathan Pleasants, deceased, Elizabeht Pleasants, administratix of Joseph Pleasants, deceased, Isaac Pleasants and Jane his wife, Samuel Pleasants, jan.(???) and Thomas Pleasants, junior, and Margaret his wife, in the ??? suit, and the defendant

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in the other suit prayed an appeal from the ??? pronounced in these ??? on the twelfth day of the present month, which is allowed them on their giving bond and security in each suit in the penalty of twenty pounds, with such condition as the law requires. June 5th, 1799 In these ???, in order that the decree of the Court of Appeals, which certified by the clerk thereof in the following words. "At a Court of Appeals, ??? at the Capitol in the City of Richmond, the sixth day of May, one thousand seven hundred and ninety-nine, Cary Pleasants & Mary Pleasants his wife, late Mary Logan, administratix of Charles Logan, and devisee of John Pleasants and Jonathan Pleasants, deceased, Elizabeth Pleasants, adminstratrix of Joseph Pleasants, Isaac Pleasants and Jane his wife, Samuel Pleasants, ??? and Margaret his wife, appellants against Robert Pleasants, son and heir of John Pleasants, apellee, and Elizabeth Pleasants appelant against Ned, a pauper, appelle, upon appeals from a decree of the High Court of Chancery, pronounced the twelfth day of September, one thousand seven hundred and ninety eight. "This day came the parties by their counsel, and the court having maturely considered the transcript of the record, and the argument of the counsel, is of opinion that there is no error in so much the decree of the said High Court "of Chancery, as ??? the demurrers of the appellants MaryPleasants, Isaac Pleasants and Samuel Pleasants, ??? for want of jursdiction in the said court; but that there is error in some of the principles, on which the decree upon the mrits is founded,and part of the reasoning thereupon is note approved by this court, therefore it is decreed and ordered, that so much of the said decree as overruled the said demurrers be affirmed, and that the residue of the said decree be reversed, and this court proceeding to make such decree as the said High court of Chancery should have pronounced, is of opinion, that altought the testators at the time of making their respective wills had not power to manumit, and if they had devised them upon conditions that the devisces(???) should emancipate them immediately, the condition being unlawful would have been void, and the property vested, yet the condition that they should become free when the law would permit it, was not of that sort. That to apply the rule respecting the limitation of the remainder of a chatted upon too remote a contingency, with all its consequences, to the present case, would be too rigid, but that a reasonable principle ought to be adopted to suit its peculiar circumstances, which is this,that if the event happens whilst the slaves remain in the possession of the family without change by the intervention of creditors

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or purchasers ??? the contending parties would be ??? whose interest had been contemplated by the testators, the bequest ought to take place, but that the case of such interving claims not being in the view of the testators it ought to be considered how far they should in equity prevent the devise of the manumission from taking effect. So far therefore as conerns the the family, the court would have had no difficulty in decreeing in favor of the paupers, if the wills had directed a general emancipation, when permitted by law, and the legislature had permitted it without any ??? annexed; but a difficulty arises from the testators' not having directed a general manumission, when allowed by law, but a limitted one, directing that all future generations(???) of these people born whilst their mothers were under thirty should serve to that age, founded by no doubt, upon considerations of the interest of his family, and that of the slaves on which middle state the legislature have not declared their will, and on the other hand the legislature have permitted an unlimited emancipation, but annexed a condition imposing upon the the person liberating certain terms for the sake of the community, of which the persons making voluntary manumissions might judge, whether they would do the act upon these terms and use their pleasure: and on these terms the testaters have not declared their minds whether they would or would not have cmpeleld the devisees against their inclination to emancipate subject to them. Under this difficulty, the cout endeavored to ??? a decree to effect the purpose of the paupers without essentialyl violating the wills, and is of opinion that hte limited manumission, according to the modifications, in the wills of the testators, can alone take place and be decreed, and that the terms for securing the public against the maintencance of the aged or infirmed, cannot be equitably imposed upon the devisees. It is therefor further decreed and ordred, that all the slaves of which ther testators were possessed as their property, at the time of their respective deaths, not subject to the claims of the creditors or purchasers, before stated, and who are now above the age of forty five years, and their increase, buorn after their respective mothers had attained the age of thirty years (so soon as Robert Pleasants the executor, the several trustees, or any other preson, shall in the courts of the several counties in which the said slave respectively reside, enter into ???, with approved security, payable to the justices then sitting in each court, and their successors, with the condition that the said slaves shall not become chargeable to the "public, or enter into one suhc bond for the whole General Court,) and sit such as are now above thirty and under the age "of forty-five years immediately shall be emancipated and set

See also

• S. Bassett French Biographical Sketch
• Other Related Wythepedia Pages

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