The Hitties were a tribal, nomadic people who emerged from the Anatolia plateau in the 17th century BCE to establish a large regional state, capturing many of the city states of Sumeria. This selection from their extensive law code focuses on issues of sex and gender.
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Tag Archives: slavery
Excerpts from the Code of Hammurapi
The Code of Hammurapi, dating from around 1772 BCE is one of the earliest sets of laws from human civilization. These excerpts address several different aspects of Sumerian society including gender, class, and slavery.
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The Kansas-Nebraska Act
The Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854 undid the Missouri Compromise of decades earlier and–potentially–opened the entire west (some said the entire nation) to slavery. The newspaper editorial below illustrates one particularly strong view about the controversial law.
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The Fugitive Slave Act of 1850
Laws which assured slave owners that runaway slaves would be returned had been in force since the ratification of the Constitution. Indeed, the Constitution required such laws. Decades later, however, many of these laws were unenforced in northern states and abolitionists actively helped runaway slaves flee ever northward to freedom. Slave owners, as part of the Compromise of 1850, pushed for the adoption of stronger fugitive slave laws. One section of the law is below.
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Defending Slavery in the Old South
This 1857 article by George Fitzhugh (“The Blessings of Slavery”) was a prime example of the assertion that slavery was not a necessary evil (as many in earlier generations had believed) but rather a positive good–both for whites and the African American slaves they owned. Many writings, such as this one, appeared to counter increasing abolitionist sentiment in the US during the 1850s.