James Stout

This proved to be a crucial test case, as Sharp argued that slavery itself was unlawful in Britain.

Lord Mansfield, the chief justice and presiding judge, was reluctant to reach a conclusion on whether the right to property outweighed the right to freedom and tried to persuade the parties to settle out of court.

When this failed, he attempted to word his decision so that he freed Somerset without setting a precedent.

Despite Mansfield's efforts, most observers, including other judges, thought that the effect of the judgment was to free slaves that were brought to Britain and that this provided a legal avenue for many slaves to obtain their freedom.

So this is kind of the case where Mansfield is doing everything he can for this not to have any wider effect.

But all people hear is that, like, well, this guy got freed, right?

Let's try it some more.

Yeah, yeah.

I feel like this makes me free, right?

Yeah.

So large numbers of enslaved people in England start fleeing their masters in an errant belief that slavery had ended on the island.

Many abolitionists who misunderstood the ruling celebrated it as a sign of the fundamental justice and equality of English law.

Judge Mansfield had to issue a note that the case was only really relevant to a specific niche situation, which caused Ben Franklin to joke that English abolitionists were celebrating the majesty of their legal system for its virtue in, quote, setting free a single Negro, right?

Where he's like, okay, guys, like, it's good, but, like, maybe calm down a little bit, you know?

Yeah, pipe down.

Yeah, this is one guy.

There's still a lot of guys.

Still a net negative.

Now, this judge, the Earl of Mansfield, is a really interesting guy because not only is he the judge in the Somerset case, he's going to be the judge in the Zorg case.

Now, this isn't weird because he's one of the most significant figures in the whole history of English law.