The 1825 law limits some hours of plantation labor

Clause 2 required plantation owners to allot land suited to growing provisions, allow twenty-eight working days between May and January for cultivation, and provide food, clothing, bedding, and...

Clause 3 allowed an enslaved person’s complaint—or information from another person—to trigger a justice’s inquiry into food, clothing, housing, and treatment. Justices could inspect an estate and...

Clause 4 urged owners and their agents to instruct enslaved people in Christianity and required parish clergy to baptize adults deemed ready and infants within six months of birth. Clergy were also to...

Clause 5 allowed two enslaved people belonging to the same owner to marry through an authorized clergyman or priest, but required written permission from that owner. Clergy were also to judge...

Clause 6 required each plantation to maintain a hospital in a suitable, healthy location for enslaved people who were sick, injured, or infirm. An “hospital-book” was to record names, admission and...

Clause 8 gave a woman with five living children attached to a plantation fifty-two days during the year to cultivate provision grounds. Its stated purpose was to encourage the increase and...

Clause 9 forbade owners from turning away enslaved people considered unable to work because of illness, age, or infirmity. Owners had to keep and support them; magistrates could investigate neglect...

Clause 10 required a free person to be present when punishment exceeded fifteen lashes and capped punishment at twenty-five lashes for an offense in a day. It restricted repeated flogging before...

Clause 13 allowed prosecution for cruel wounding, mutilation, or confinement without support. Where the enslaver was convicted, a court could order the person sold to another buyer or declare them...

Clause 14 permitted an enslaved person alleged to have been wantonly punished or confined to testify in the trial of the person accused of that abuse. In that specific setting the witness did not need...