Elizabeth Freeman
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Elizabeth Freeman, also known as Mumbet, was one of the first slaves to file and win a freedom suit in Massachusetts. The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court, ruling in Freeman's favor, found slavery
Portrait by Susan Anne Ridley Sedgwick, c. 1812
Statue in Sheffield
Quock Walker
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Quock Walker, also known as Kwaku or Quork Walker, was an enslaved American who sued for and won his freedom suit case in June 1781. The court cited language in the 1780 Constitution of Massachusetts
Elizabeth Freeman
…1780 Constitution of Massachusetts. Her suit, Brom and Bett v. Ashley (1781), was cited in the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court appellate review of Quock Walker's freedom suit. When the court upheld Walker's freedom under the state's constitution, the ruling was considered to have implicitly ended slavery in…
Chief Justice William Cushing