Supreme Court of Judicature of New Jersey.
POTTS
v.
HARPER.
May Term, 1813.
ON CERTIORARI.
A black witness, reputed free from childhood, sworn without other proof [of] his freedom.
The error assigned in this case was, that on the trial of the cause in the common pleas, the court admitted a black man to be sworn as a witness, without evidence of his freedom. The fact was, that the man had been considered and reputed by his neighbors, to be free from his childhood, but it was contended, that nothing short of proof that he was born free, or that he had been manumitted, and the instrument of manumission produced in court, would have been sufficient.
BY THE COURT.
We think the Common Pleas did right.
Let judgment be affirmed.
Ewing, for plaintiff.