allowed the slave to be set free in all cases. In 1829 the legislature passed an act making it the duty of an executor or an administrator with the will annexed, where a testator by will directed that his slaves be set free, to petition the county court to set the slaves free, and if he failed or neglected to do so, the slaves themselves could file their petition and obtain their freedom. It was the universal law of Christendom that the child of a slave mother was a slave, partus sequitur ventrem; but, notwithstand ing this well-recognized principle of law, the courts of Tennessee often construed it so strictly in the interests of freedom, that it was of but little force. As early as 1813 the Supreme Court of Tennessee decided that a child born after the emanation of the writ in a suit for free dom by the mother, but before any freedom had ever been decreed her by any court, was a free child.1 In another case, one John Bayless liberated his slave, to take effect at the death of himself and wife. After his death, but before the death of his wife, a child was born to the slave, and the court held that, notwithstanding the mother was a slave, the act of Bayless was an act of emancipation in presenti to take effect in the future, and that the child was free.2 In the year 1800 Thomas Bond died, leav ing a will, in which appeared the following clause; "All young negroes which I may have in my possession at the time of my decease, shall have their freedom when they respectively arrive at the age of twenty-five." Clarissa, one of the slaves, was about ten years of age at the date of the death of her master, and, under the will, would be free when she reached the age of twenty-five. Before she reached that age, she became the mother of three children, and the ques tion which came before the court for judi cial determination, was the legal status of these children. 1 Edward v. McConnell, Cooke, 305. 2 Hartsell v. George, 3 Hum., 257.

It was contended, first, as they were the children of a slave mother, they were slaves for life, and secondly, that if not slaves for life, at least, they would be slaves until they respectively reached the age of twenty-five. The supreme court decided, that when the mother reached the age of twenty-five, she carried her three children into freedom- with her. In delivering the opinion in this case, the Court say : " In giving construction to the will made pursuant to the statute, the court must bear in mind the claim is one involving human liberty, and that the testa tor's intention must be favorably interpreted to this end."3 This case was decided in March, 1834, and it is worthy of notice, that, at the Jan uary term of the same year, the Supreme Court of the United States, upon substan tially the same facts, and in a case arising in Tennessee, took a directly opposite view of the law. In the case referred to, Patrick McCutchen made his will in Tennessee in 18 1 2, by which he devised to his wife his slaves for life, and at her death, they were to be set free. And if there were any slaves which had not arrived at the age of twentyone at the date of the wife's death, such were to become free when they respectively reached that age. Two of these had issue, after the death of the testator but before the death of the wife; and the Supreme Court of the United States decided, on the principle of partus sequitur ventrem, that these children were slaves for life.4 In 1825, one Abraham Vernon made his will, as follows: "My negroes (naming them), I wish her (his wife), to keep, and if they are obedient to her, and at my wife's death, I wish them to be set free; and, if they should be disobedient to my wife, she may dispose of them as she pleases." Abra ham died, and soon after his widow, aged sixty, married one William Sharp a lad of eighteen summers. In 1834 the wife died 3 Harris v. Clarissa, 6 Yerg., 240.

• McCutchen v. Marshall, 8 Pet., 235.