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An Act to amend the Criminal Law. 1864-1865 271 (1865)

handle is hein.slavery/ssactssc0462 and id is 1 raw text is: OF SOUTH CAROLINA.                                    271
AN ACT PrELIMITNARY TO THE LEGISLATTON INDUCED BY THE EMrANOVpA- A* D. 1865.
TION oV SLAVES.
Whereas the Convention of this State, by the Constitution.latoly ra1ti No, 4730;
tied, did recognize the omanoipation of slaves, and declare that. neitheri' Piinble,
slavery nor invohntary servitude, except as a punighment for crime, shall
over be re-established in this State, and did dirct that, for each District
in the State, there should be established an Inferior Court, to be styled
the District Court, which Court shall have jurisdiction of all civil causes
wherein one or both of the parties are persons of color, and of all critminal
causes wherein the accused is a person of color; therefore,
I. Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives, now met and  Prlminioary
sitting in General Assembly, and by the authority of the same, That this Lo ver t.aiIn
Act shall be preliminary to ''An Act to establish and regulatokho domei tic
relations of persons of color, and to amend the law in relation to
paupers, vagrancy and bastardy; and An Act to establish District
Courts, and An Act to amend the Criminal Law, which Acts have
been induced by the Constitution aforesaid; and that inroference to those
Acts the following provisions shall obtain:
II. Words importing the singular number only shall be constrned to Con s oril C-
apply to several persons or things as well as one person or thing, and t1n or wolrdli.
every word importing the masculino gonder only, shall be construed to
extend to a female as well as a male, whero the context does not forbid
such construction.
III. All free negroes, mulattoes and mostizoes, all freedmen and freed-  Persowi  or
women, and all descendants through either sex of any of these persons,  olor.
shall be known as persons (!f color, except that every such descendant, who
may have of Caucasian blood seven-eighths or more, shell be deemed a
wvhite person.
IV. The statutes and regulations concerning slaves are now inapplicable 1ti gbltn t 
to persons of color; and although such persons are not entitled to social colord p e r -
or political equality with white persons, they shall have the right to sons.
acquire, own and dispose of property; to make contracts; to enjoy the
fruits of their labor; to sue and be sued; and to receive protection under
the law in their persons and property.
V. All rights and remedies respecting persons or property, and all duties Iligts ad
and liabilities under laws, civil and criminal, which apply to whito persons, remoIIeP ex-
are extended to persons of color, subject to the modifications made by this
Act and the other Acts hereinbofore mentioned.
In the Senate House, the nineteenth day of December, ih the year
of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-five.
W. D. PORTER, President qf the Senate.
C. II, SIMONTON, Speaker HTouse qf Renpresenatives.
Approved : JAMEs L. Ouint.
AN ACT TO AMEND THE CIiIMINAL LAW.                    No. 473L
De it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives, now met and
sitting in General Assembly, and by the authority of the same, as follows:.
SOME 'ELONIES WITHOUT BENEFIT Or CLERGY.
I. Either of the crimes specified in this first section shall be felony  Asstils.
without benefit of clergy, to wit: For a person of color to commit any
willful homicide unless in self-defence; for a. person of color to commit
an assault upon a white woman with manifest intent to ravish her; for a
person of color to have sexual intercourse with a white woman by per- Itape.

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