In a just society, the law both constrains action,
prevents us, or punishes us for certain behaviors.
But it also outlines our liberties,
domains where we are free from the interference of others and the government.
It outlines the rules of the road so that anyone can play and demand fair treatment.
The laws that govern contracts, govern marriage, govern what we owe to each other.
All of these bind and free us in turn.
But what was the law to a slave?
My name is Jerusalem Dempsis.
I'm a staff writer here at the Atlantic.
And in today's episode of Good on Paper, I've asked Berkeley historian Dylan C.
Penningroth to join me to investigate this very question.
Dylan wrote a highly acclaimed book titled before the The Hidden History of Black Civil Rights,
where he complicates the traditional narrative about how slaves interacted with the law
and the unexpected ways they interact with the legal system.
But I'll let Dylan explain that narrative.
It's the one we're familiar with.
The master narrative of African Americans in the Law, I think, is at some level, pretty simple.
It's that they were oppressed by law, they were outsiders to law,
that if they had any contact with law, it was as an oppressive force.