.. that certain rights have been
conferred upon them by positive law and judicial determination, and other
privileges and indulgences have been conceded to them by the universal
consent of their owners. By uniform and universal usage they are
constituted the agents of their owners and sent on business without written
authority. And in like manner they are sent to perform those neighborly
good offices common in every community.... The simple truth is, such
indulgences have been so long and so uniformly tolerated, the public
sentiment upon the subject has acquired almost the force of positive law."
The judgment of the lower court was accordingly reversed and Jones was
relieved of liability for his laxness.[28]
[Footnote 28: Head's _Tennessee Reports_, I, 627-639.]
There were sharp limits, nevertheless, to the lenity of the courts. Thus
when one Brazeale of Mississippi carried with him to Ohio and there set
free a slave woman of his and a son whom he had begotten of her, and then
after taking them home again died bequeathing all his property to the
mulatto boy, the supreme court of the state, in 1838, declared the
manumission void under the laws and awarded the mother and son along with
all the rest of Brazeale's estate to his legitimate heirs who had brought
the suit.
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