|
JOHN FRANCIS MERCER, ESQUIRE, GOVERNOR.
he is hereby required and directed, (a) to proceed to all such servant
or slave, and immediately to give public notice by advertisements,
to be set up at the court-house door and such other public
places as he shall think proper, in the county where such servant or
slave is in custody, of the time and place for sale of such servant or
slave, by him to be appointed, not less than twenty days after the
time limited as aforesaid has expired, and at such time and place
shall proceed to sell and dispose of such servant or slave to the
highest bidder.
(a) By 1817, ch. 112, s. 6, the
sheriff, instead of selling the servant or slave as
directed by the latter part of this section, is to carry him before a judge
of the
county or orphans court, who is to examine whether he be a slave or not,
and if
believed to be a slave, to remand him to prison, and cause notice to be
given to
the supposed owner. If after such remand, and within the time for
which he may
be remanded, no person applies for and proves title to such suspected runaway,
the
sheriff shall discharge him. But if the judge shall not believe such
suspected
runaway to be a slave, he shall order him to be released. |
1802.
CHAP. 96. |
3. AND BE IT ENACTED, That the sheriff shall,
under the penalty
of fifty dollars for every such offence, make out, on oath, and return
to the justices of the levy court, at their next session after the
sale of any servant or slave, an account stating the time of the
commitment, the time of sale, the name of the purchaser and terms
of sale, and the expenses and costs of advertising, securing and
keeping, and the amount for which such servant or slave has been
sold, and out of the money arising from such sale to retain the amount
of such costs and charges as he is by law entitled to, and no
more, and the balance, if any, to be paid to the justices of the levy
court, who are hereby authorised and directed to pay the same to
the owner of such servant or slave, if such owner shall apply for it
within two years from the time of such sale, and if it shall not be
applied for within two years as aforesaid, then the money so paid
to the levy court shall be applied to the use of the county; Provided,
that any servant or slave sold as aforesaid shall not be carried or
transported out of this state until after two years have elapsed from
the time of such sale, and any person or persons who shall carry,
or cause to be carried out of this state, within the time limited as
aforesaid, any such servant or slave, shall incur and be subject to
the like penalties as persons are who shall transport or carry any
free negro out of this state.
See note under section 2. |
To return to levy
court an account
of expenses.
Proviso. |
4. AND BE IT ENACTED, That if any sheriff
shall refuse or neglect
to comply with the directions of this act, he shall, for every such
refusal or neglect, forfeit and pay the sum of one hundred dollars. |
Penalty for neglect. |
5. AND BE IT ENACTED, That an act, entitled,
A supplement to
the act relating to servants and slaves, passed May session, seventeen
hundred and nineteen, * and an act, entitled, An act to restrain
the ill practices of sheriffs, and to direct their conduct respecting
runaways, passed November session, seventeen hundred and ninety-two,
† be and they are hereby severally repealed. |
Acts repealed.
* Ch. 2.
† Ch. 72. |
_____
|
|
CHAP. XCVII.
An Act for the relief of sundry Insolvent Debtors. Lib.
JG. No. 4,
fol. 308.
A Supplement ch. 112. |
Passed Jan. 8, 1803. |
VOL. I.
28
|
 |
