Sunday Favorites: The Day the Enslaved Challenged the System

It was a grisly scene. A trail of blood led down a dirt path, lined with dead and dying mules. Adam, the enslaved caretaker of the animals, routinely let them roam the Florida scrub for lengths of time, foraging sustenance as they had done before they’d been broken and brought to Joseph M. Hernandez’s Plantation in St. Augustine, Fla. Allowing them that freedom was intended to be a gift, not a death sentence.

The mules had been shot by another enslaved man named Luke at a neighboring plantation. Luke was the “head driver,” a supervisor of sorts, and knew the mules were always getting into an enclosed garden. When he asked Abraham Dupont, the owner of the plantation, what to do about them. He said, “Shoot them,” according to the 2005 article in the Florida Quarterly entitled “Did Slaves Have Free Will? Luke, a Slave, vs. Florida and Crime at the Command of the Master,” by Craig Buettinger.  

The next time the mules wandered onto the property, Luke was ready. He shot and mortally wounded three, all of whom succumbed to their injuries on their way home. Adam had discovered their bodies where they lay to die. Luke pleaded not guilty but was subsequently convicted by a St. Johns Circuit Court of malicious destruction of property, for which he was sentenced to three months in prison, Buettinger said.

One of the key witnesses in the case was Adam, who’d followed the blood trail to the Dupont plantation and encountered Luke there. When he asked Luke what happened, he admitted to shooting the animals at the command of his owner because the animals had destroyed Dupont’s “prisoners’ garden,” according to the article “Luke vs. The State of Florida” on the African American Heritage website.

McQueen McIntosh, Luke’s attorney, appealed the verdict and took the case all the way to the Florida Supreme Court. Luke was only carrying out the direction of his master, after all. Why should he be punished simply for following orders?

The dilemma had come up before. In 1811, Georgia had amended its penal code concerning enslaved individuals, stating any “slave committing a crime (except felony) by command of master, owner or employer is not guilty, but the master, etc. is,” according to “The Slave Laws of Georgia 1755-1860.”

Initially, Florida had mirrored Georgia's actions. Nevertheless, as other slave states declined to adopt this measure, Florida changed its stance and revoked that segment of the penal code, Buettinger wrote.

In the spring of 1853, when the Florida Supreme Court was in session, McIntosh, and prosecutor John P. Sanderson argued the issue of whether slaves had free will when committing a crime at the command of their owner, Buettinger said.

Dupont’s plantation was a large one, retaining a total of 169 slaves. Being a “head driver” was a well-respected position and often only attained through nepotism or birthright. Luke may have been born on the plantation to earn such status or was perhaps the son or direct relative of his predecessor. The position of “head diver” was normally held by well-trusted, mature men who were loyal to their owners. They were also the only enslaved individuals who took direct orders from the plantation owner. Luke’s position helped his case immensely, according to Buettinger.  

Dupont had also hired McIntosh to defend Luke, believing him to be innocent of any crime. After he was convicted in circuit court in November 1851, McIntosh made a motion for the judge to overturn the verdict. When the judge argued there wasn’t enough time left in the session to consider it, he pledged $1,000 bail, also funded by Dupont, to be forfeited should Luke not return to court in the next session, Buettinger wrote.

Despite the efforts, the judge denied overturning the verdict on August 23, 1852, so McIntosh appealed the case to the Florida Supreme Court. He argued that because Luke was enslaved, he lacked “free will” and made the decision to kill the mules based solely on the wishes of his master.

The free-will issue struck the judges as extremely significant, so much so they declined to rule on it. As one justice explained, free will “presents one of the most interesting questions which can arise out of the institution of slavery.”

Despite the significance, the justices ultimately decided to “pass over it without expressing or imitating an opinion, … in hope that if it is ever again presented for adjudication, we may be enabled to give it that consideration and reflection which its interest and importance demand and which the present limited term of court here will not permit,” according to the case.

In the end, the justices abstained from ruling on the issue of free will but overturned the verdict of the lower court. Luke’s case subsequently set the standard for other cases that forced confessions couldn't be used as evidence, and juries had to find defendants not guilty when there was reasonable doubt, two of the key foundations in our legal system today.