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An Act for the Gradual Abolition of Slavery, passed by the Fifth Pennsylvania General Assembly on 1 March 1780, prescribed an end for slavery in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania in the United States. It was the first slavery abolition act in the course of human history to be adopted by an elected body.
During the American Revolutionary War, Pennsylvania passed the Gradual Abolition Act (1780), the first such law in the new United States. Pennsylvania law freed those children born to enslaved mothers after that date. They had to serve lengthy indentured servitude until age 28 before becoming free as adults.
Pennsylvania's An Act for the Gradual Abolition of Slavery of 1780 was the first legislative enactment in the United States. [4] It specified that Every Negro and Mulatto child born within the State after the passing of the Act (1780) would be free upon reaching age twenty-eight." [4]
In 1780, Pennsylvania passed the Gradual Abolition Act, which freed all future children of the state's slaves. [a] It also prohibited non-resident slaveholders living in Pennsylvania from holding slaves in the state for longer than six months.
In 1780, Pennsylvania passed a law that provided for the gradual abolition of slavery, making Pennsylvania the first state to pass an act to abolish slavery, although Vermont (not yet a state) had also previously abolished slavery. [32]
On March 29, 1788, the State of Pennsylvania passed an amendment to one of its laws (An Act for the Gradual Abolition of Slavery, originally enacted March 1, 1780): "No negro or mulatto slave... shall be removed out of this state, with the design and intention that the place of abode or residence of such slave or servant shall be thereby altered or changed."
With the 1780 Act for the Gradual Abolition of Slavery, Pennsylvania's government was the first to begin an abolition of slavery. But the state law was very gradual, and highly-respectful of the property rights of slaveholders. It freed only the future children of enslaved mothers.
With the 1780 Gradual Abolition Act, Pennsylvania became the first state to establish a process to emancipate slaves. However, no one was freed immediately. However, no one was freed immediately. The process was to play out over decades and not end until the death of the last person enslaved in Pennsylvania.