In 1641, freemen of the Massachusetts Bay Colony adopted the Body of Liberties as the first law code written in New England. In 1648 they revised them for the first printed law code, the Book of General Laws and Liberties. 

The laws articulated a set of rights as well as obligations owed by individuals to each other. English social custom, the Bible and Puritan philosophy mixed to form the legal structure of this new society.

Many people today see these laws as laying the foundation for individual American liberties and rights. Few realize that the pivotal Puritan texts were also the first in the North American colonies to encode slavery into law. 

In the 21st century, we can judge this apparent conflict between liberty and slavery as a contradiction. But how did the Puritans reconcile liberty and slavery? Did they see the concepts as inherently in conflict? What were the social assumptions embedded in these early rights and laws, and what were the consequences for colonists, Native Americans and enslaved people? 

These are the questions we explored in this discussion - and their relevance today.

Roxanne Reddington-Wilde is a member of the board of the Partnership of Historic Bostons and a teacher. A specialist in the Scottish highlands of the 17th and 18th centuries, she earned her PhD from Harvard in Celtic Languages and Literatures. 

What we read:

The Body of Liberties, 1641  https://history.hanover.edu/texts/masslib.html

General Laws and Liberties, 1648  http://puritanism.online.fr/puritanism/sources/lawslibertyes1648.html

A Mass Moments posting on slavery https://www.massmoments.org/moment-details/first-slaves-arrive-in-massachusetts.html

Have a look, too, at this fascinating and important article on our blog, about Cotton Mather and slavery  https://historicbostons.org/blog-1/ofblood