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The Relationship of Legal Rule and Slavery during the Nineteenth Century seeks to understand the use of legal institutions within the antebellum slave market and the market economy. The purpose of this paper is to focus on historiographical synthesis, the methods uses, theories engaged, and theoretical interventions proposed by the sources used throughout the paper. The remainder of the paper will be focused on the conversation of what kinds of sources could push the field forward and primary sources that will assist in further research of the topic. Historical questions that could assist with the development of the research include, but are not limited too: how was law used to promote growth of slavery within the emancipation of the American Marketplace, what was the role of legal institutions in the antebellum south in regards to contract and property, and lastly, what is the relationship between legal institutions and slavery? All of these questions will promote the growth of research on slavery and capitalism.
In order to assist the development of this paper a discussion of possible sources needs to be discussed. The use of contracts as legal documents in the marketplace or on plantations can help understand how slavery and legal rule were closely intertwined. By assessing the contracts, it will provide new outlook on how certain transactions were justified within legal rule. How did the law justify the contracts and transactions of the slaves as commodities in the south? Another source that could offer assistance is the use of courtroom logs and lawyer files to see how the courts dealt with slavery. Lawyers can provide a different set of eyes in looking at the relationship of slavery in the marketplace. This also ties in with any dairies or biographies lawyers/ courtroom officials in their dealings with slave owners, slave traders, and slaves in disputes of contracts and property. In addition to the courtroom logs, manifests from steamships throughout the south can assist in portraying the involvement of business transactions and insurances to take slaves up and down the south. Business papers can prove to be another good source to use to get a different perspective of business transactions and the dealings of businessmen in the American marketplace. The hope by using business papers, legal documents, contracts, manifests, and courtroom logs is to demonstrate the negative effect liberal capitalist institutions could have on the integrity of slavery in the process of legal rule.