Qualified versus unqualified equality language steered states toward or against slavery.

Evidence

Perhaps Jefferson and many other free white American men took this phrase as proclaiming their equal creation with those once thought their betters without applying to those they deemed beneath them, including enslaved Blacks and women. This could help explain why Jefferson freed only 10 of the more than 600 persons he held in bondage. In 1776, when the slaveholding states of Virginia and Delaware used similar words in their state constitutions, they qualified them to apply only to persons in society, which excluded Native Americans and enslaved Blacks. For northern states that used this phrase in their state constitutions without qualification, it prodded them toward ending slavery. When an enslaved Massachusetts woman known as Mum Bett first heard the phrase quoted from her state’s new constitution in 1780, she demanded and secured her freedom in court. — Edward J. Larson, Declaring Independence, 9

Categorization

• XREF: Core to course debate: competing meanings of ‘all men are created equal’ and how doctrine shapes outcomes. — connects to: Rights theory arose in slave-trading states and could justify slavery
• QUESTION: Worth chasing the Mum Bett case as an early instance of litigating constitutional equality language.

Broader Connections

• Rights theory arose in slave-trading states and could justify slavery #qualifies (0.85)