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Official Records - Virginia Laws

Virginia Laws
       1600-1699
       1700-1750
       1751-1800
County Records
House of Burgesses Journals
Other Documents

As slavery became a significant part of Virginia's economy, the colony's leaders enacted laws establishing and perpetuating the institution. In the beginning these laws traced the differences between slave laborers and indentured servants, gradually distinguishing race as the most prominent feature. By the eighteenth century, Virginia's white leaders had created a full range of separate legal provisions for slave and free, black and white.