South Carolina Expands Slave Patrol Powers After Stono Rebellion

In the immediate aftermath of the 1739 Stono Rebellion, South Carolina dramatically expanded the powers of its slave patrol system through the comprehensive Negro Act of 1740. Patrols were enlarged in size and given broader authority to stop, search, and punish any enslaved person found without a written pass. Plantation owners were required to maintain specified patrol responsibilities. The act also prohibited enslaved people from assembling in groups, learning to write, earning their own money, or growing their own food to sell. The 1740 patrol expansion created one of the most comprehensive systems of racialized surveillance in the colonial world and served as a model for patrol legislation in other colonies. South Carolina by 1740 had a Black majority — roughly two-thirds of the population — making this expansion of coercive control a direct response to the demographic reality that enslaved people outnumbered white colonists.