During the American colonial period a freeman was a person who was not a slave. The term originated in 12th-century Europe.
In the Massachusetts Bay Colony, a man had to be a member of the Church to be a freeman; in neighboring Plymouth Colony a man did not need to be a member of the Church, but he had to be elected to this privilege by the General Court. Being a freeman carried with it the right to vote, and in Plymouth only freemen could vote by 1632.[1]
Black's Law Dictionary (9th edition) defines freeman as follows:
1. A person who possesses and enjoys all the civil and political rights belonging to the people under a free government.
2. A person who is not a slave.
3. Hist. A member of a municipal corporation (a city or a borough) who possesses full civic rights, esp. the right to vote.
4. Hist. A freeholder. Cf. villein.
5. Hist. An allodial landowner. Cf. vassal. - also written free man.[2]
"Freedom" was earned after an allotted time, or after the person demanding "payment" was satisfied. This was known as indentured servitude, and was not originally intended as a stigma or embarrassment for the person involved; many of the sons and daughters of the wealthy and famous of the time found themselves forced into such temporary servitude, Gary Nash reporting that "many of the servants were actually nephews, nieces, cousins and children of friends of emigrating Englishmen, who paid their passage in return for their labor once in America."[3]
An indentured servant would sign a contract agreeing to serve for a specific number of years, typically five or seven. Many immigrants to the colonies came as indentured servants, with someone else paying their passage to the Colonies in return for a promise of service. At the end of his service, according to the contract, the indentured servant usually would be granted a sum of money, a new suit of clothes, land, or perhaps passage back to England. An indentured servant was not the same as an apprentice or a child who was "placed out."
Once a man was made a freeman and was no longer considered a common, he could become a member of the church (and would usually do so) and he could own land. The amount of land that he was able to own was sometimes determined by how many members there were in his family. As a freeman, he became a member of the governing body, which met in annual or semiannual meetings (town meetings) to make and enforce laws and pass judgment in civil and criminal matters. As the colonies grew, these meetings became impractical and a representative bicameral system was developed. Freemen would choose deputy governors who made up the upper house of the General Court, and assistant governors who made up the lower house, who chose the governor from among their ranks and passed judgments in civil and criminal matters. To hold one of these offices it was required, of course, for one to be a freeman. Thus, the enfranchised voters and office holders were landholding male church members. Non-Puritans were not made freeman.
- ^ Stratton, Eugene Aubrey (1986). Plymouth Colony: Its History and People 1620 - 1691. Salt Lake City, UT: Ancestry Publishing. pp. 146–147. ISBN 0-916489-18-3.
- ^ Garner, Bryan A., Editor in Chief (2009). Black's Law Dictionary (9th ed.). St. Paul, MN USA: West Publishing. pp. 736–737. ISBN 978-0-314-19949-2.
{{cite book}}:|first1=has generic name (help)CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) - ^ Gary Nash, The Urban Crucible: The Northern Seaports and the Origins of the American Revolution (1979) p 15