Browse Results for “

Creator is exactly Mississippi. Legislature

”

This act, also known as the Mississippi Married Women's Property Act, this law granted married women in Mississippi the right to own property in their own names. Previously, under the doctrine of coverture, married women were required to list all property in their husbands' names. This legislation followed the 1837 Mississippi court ruling in Fisher v. Allen, a case that disputed a woman's right to claim an enslaved person in her own name during her husband's property dispute. While this law effectively established property rights for married women, men also used the statute to shield their assets from creditors by listing them under their wives' names. Mississippi was the first state to pass such a law.

Black Codes were enacted by former slave states following the abolishment of slavery with the 13th Amendment in order to restrict the freedom of Black people. Mississippi was the first state to pass such codes in November 1865. Laws like these to the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1866 and the Fourteenth Amendment.