Citing divine and human laws: women of African descent and the New Orleans Cabildo, 1769-1800

This thesis explores how free and enslaved women of African descent utilized the New Orleans courts from 1769 to 1800, and how their actions affected the formation of the city's social order. While some scholars have engaged a few of these women's court cases in their works, I explore these cases as a collective body. In doing so, I argue that these women's activities and the reactions that they elicited from the city's elite population, all had a part in the development of New Orleans society. This thesis first provides contextual information regarding the Spanish institution of the New Orleans Cabildo courts, and then explores the major court cases that African and Afro - Creole women were involved in, including litigations in which enslaved women legally freed themselves, free women acquired or protected their property, and other civil and criminal cases. As these women gained power over their own lives and influence in New Orleans society, their appearances in the courts increasingly concerned the elite men who served as the Cabildo. These elite men in power then responded by attempting to limit the socio - economic activities of enslaved and free Afro - Louisianan women in formal litigations and official legislations. Some of their efforts were more successful than others. Regardless, women of African ancestry continuously struggled against the Cabildo's oppression against them. As these women strove to attain power and influence over their own lives and social standing, the elites continued to try and keep them in positions of relative powerlessness. This resulted in a multi - faceted process of action and reaction that assisted the formation of the New Orleans social order, and it was the activities of both free and enslaved women of African descent that remained intrinsic to its creation.