Although most African Americans in the early Republic were slaves, small free black communities existed in both the North and the South. However, their civil and political rights were often significantly curtailed. In South Carolina, free blacks lived under the harsh rules of the Negro Act of 1740, passed in the wake of the Stono rebellion, which restricted their freedom of movement and assembly, among other constraints. In 1791 free blacks in Charleston petitioned the state legislature for increased judicial rights.

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