Document Text |
Summary |
| “An Act for the protection and preservation of the rights of Married Women.” | |
| Section 1. Be it enacted, by the Legislature of the State of Mississippi, That any married woman may become seized or possessed of any property, real or personal, by direct bequest, demise, gift, purchase, or distribution, in her own name, and as of her own property: Provided, the same does not come from her husband after coverture. | The Mississippi state government declares that married women can possess property. |
| Section 2. And be it further enacted, That hereafter when any woman possessed of a property in slaves, shall marry, her property in such slaves and their natural increase shall continue to her, notwithstanding her coverture; and she shall have, hold, and possess the same, as her separate property, exempt from any liability for the debts or contracts of the husband. | If a women owns enslaved people, she retains her rights over them if she gets married. These enslaved people cannot be claimed to pay off the debts of her husband. |
| Section 3. And be it further enacted, That when any woman, during coverture, shall become entitled to, or possessed of, slaves by conveyance, gift, inheritance, distribution, or otherwise, such slaves, together with their natural increase, shall ensure and belong to the wife, in like manner as is above provided as to slaves which she may possess at the time of marriage. | If a married woman receives enslaved people as a gift or inheritance, they are her property. They cannot be claimed to pay off the debts of her husband. |
| Section 4. And be it further enacted, That the control and management of all such slaves, the direction of their labor, and the receipt of the productions thereof, shall remain to the husband, agreeably to the laws heretofore in force. All suits to recover the property or possession of such slaves, shall be prosecuted or defended, as the case may be, in the joint names of the husband and wife. In the case of the death of the wife, such slaves descend and go to the children of her and her said husband, jointly begotten, and in case there shall be no child born to the wife during such her coverture, then such slaves shall descend and go to the husband and to his heirs. | Any enslaved people owned by a married woman will be managed by her husband. Her husband is also the owner of any goods the enslaved people produce. If the enslaved people are claimed in a lawsuit, it must name the husband and wife together. If the wife dies, her enslaved people pass first to any children she had with her husband. If there are no children, the husband will inherit the enslaved people. |
| Section 5. And be it further enacted, That the slaves owned by a femme covert under the provisions of this act, may be sold by the joint deed of husband and wife, executed, proved, and recorded, agreeably to the laws now in force in regard to the conveyance of the real estate of femme coverts, and not otherwise. | Enslaved people owned by a woman can be sold by a deed that both the husband and wife approve. |
“An Act for the Protection and Preservation of the rights of Married Women,” Mississippi Laws, 1839, ch. 46, p. 72.
Background
In the early U.S., women’s status was defined by the legal principle of coverture. Under coverture, married women had no legal or economic identity apart from their husbands. They could not own property, run businesses, or represent themselves in court.
But not every woman in the U.S. was raised under this legal principle. Indigenous women’s rights varied from community to community, but in many tribes, Indigenous women had more rights than white women. Mexican women had the legal right to inherit and own land separate from their husbands. When the U.S. government tried to limit the rights of Mexican women in lands gained after the Mexican-American War, those women pushed back.
These differences resulted in the advancement of women’s rights in the case of Chickasaw woman Betsy Love. Betsy inherited enslaved people from her parents. She was married to a white man named James Allen, but the couple followed the Chickasaw tradition of holding her property separate from his. In 1831, James lost a court case and was ordered to surrender all of his personal property to pay his fine. The government officials who collected his property also took the enslaved people who belonged to Betsy, citing the U.S. law that anything a wife brought to a marriage became the property of her husband. Betsy sued, and her case went all the way to the Mississippi Supreme Court. In 1837, the court ruled in her favor, saying that she had the right to follow the customs she was raised with.
White legislators took notice of the verdict. They reasoned that if an Indigenous woman could protect her property from her husband’s debts, then a white woman ought to be able to do the same. Two years later, Mississippi became the first state to pass a law that guaranteed all married women a right to own property separate from their husbands.
About the Document
This is the first U.S. law that guaranteed women the right to own property separate from their husbands. Most of the law focuses on the right to inherit and transfer enslaved people. This is because gifting enslaved people was the easiest way for parents to pass wealth to their children before the Civil War.
This law makes several references to upholding coverture. This indicates that the legislators were willing to give women some rights to protect family property but were not advancing the cause of women’s equality.
Vocabulary
- Chickasaw: The Indigenous community that originally inhabited territory that stretched across modern-day Mississippi, Alabama, Tennessee, and Kentucky. Today, the Chickasaw nation is headquartered in Oklahoma
- Civil War: U.S. war from 1861 to 1865 in which the Northern and Southern states fought over the question of whether the practice of slavery should continue in the U.S.
- coverture: A common-law practice where women fell under the legal and economic oversight of their husbands upon marriage
- Mexican-American War: 1846—1848 war between U.S. and Mexico over control of lands along their shared border
Discussion Questions
- What right does this law grant to women? Why is this an important moment in women’s history?
- Why does the law repeatedly refer to the legal principle of coverture? What does this reveal about the legislators’ intentions?
- Why did white men support the passage of this law? Why was it celebrated by women’s rights activists?
- What role did cultural exchange play in the development of this law?
Suggested Activities
- Include Betsy Love’s story in any lesson about the passage of women’s property rights.
- For another example of Indigenous women’s property rights, see Indigenous Land Ownership.
- To understand the legal history of coverture in the U.S., see Coverture and Reaffirming Coverture.
- To help students understand why white women wanted to have control of their inherited property, ask them to read the life story of Ella Gertrude Clanton Thomas and then discuss how this law may have affected the trajectory of her life.
- To learn more about slavery in Indigenous communities, see Life Story: Elizabeth Kahuga Shoeboots, The Cherokee Homefront, Slavery and Indian Removal, and Navajo “Slave” Blanket.
Themes
POLITICS AND POWER
