Book contents
- British Law and Literature in the Long Eighteenth Century
- British Law and Literature in the Long Eighteenth Century
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures
- Contributors
- Acknowledgments
- Introduction
- Chapter 1 “Every Common Reader”
- Chapter 2 Perpendicular Publics
- Chapter 3 Ambivalence, Survival, and Law in Defoe’s Journal of the Plague Year
- Chapter 4 The Court of Justice and the Court of Conscience
- Chapter 5 “A Higher Tribunal”
- Chapter 6 Mansfield, Burrow, and the Reformulation of the Legal Decision
- Chapter 7 Novel Subjects
- Chapter 8 Common Law and Cultural Difference in Scott’s Ivanhoe and Chronicles of the Canongate
- Chapter 9 The Legal Character of Paupers in Early Nineteenth-Century England
- Chapter 10 Liberty in “Parenthesis”
- Chapter 11 Yearning for Restriction in the Romantic Novel
- Select Bibliography
- Index
Chapter 10 - Liberty in “Parenthesis”
The Case of The Slave, Grace (1827) and Antislavery Satire in The History of Mary Prince (1831)
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 19 September 2025
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Book contents
- British Law and Literature in the Long Eighteenth Century
- British Law and Literature in the Long Eighteenth Century
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures
- Contributors
- Acknowledgments
- Introduction
- Chapter 1 “Every Common Reader”
- Chapter 2 Perpendicular Publics
- Chapter 3 Ambivalence, Survival, and Law in Defoe’s Journal of the Plague Year
- Chapter 4 The Court of Justice and the Court of Conscience
- Chapter 5 “A Higher Tribunal”
- Chapter 6 Mansfield, Burrow, and the Reformulation of the Legal Decision
- Chapter 7 Novel Subjects
- Chapter 8 Common Law and Cultural Difference in Scott’s Ivanhoe and Chronicles of the Canongate
- Chapter 9 The Legal Character of Paupers in Early Nineteenth-Century England
- Chapter 10 Liberty in “Parenthesis”
- Chapter 11 Yearning for Restriction in the Romantic Novel
- Select Bibliography
- Index
Summary
In The Slave, Grace (1827), William Scott, Lord Stowell, Chief Justice of the High Court of Admiralty, ruled that although Grace James, an enslaved Antiguan woman, had been free during her 1822–23 residence in England with the family she served, she reverted to her enslaved status after returning to Antigua. This chapter examines James’s efforts to obtain her freedom by surrendering herself to Antigua customs officers as contraband under the slave trade abolition statutes. It considers how her claims were contested in the Antigua courts and supported by abolitionist lawyers in London. The chapter also shows how satirical newspaper editorials in response to Stowell’s ruling undermined the legitimacy of slavery. It concludes by examining how Mary Prince, who was effectively exiled in London by Stowell’s ruling, likewise used satire and knowing irony in The History of Mary Prince (1831) to expose the inconsistencies and contradictions of the law of slavery and freedom in the British Empire.
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- British Law and Literature in the Long Eighteenth Century , pp. 209 - 230Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2025
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