Hi, Ms. Nel. You asked if a person under 21 could buy a slave in the 17th- and 18th-centuries.  The question of buying and selling personalty by those "under age" arises frequently enough that an explanation is needed.  While I welcome the comments/corrections of others, the following is my abbreviated view of the law as it was.

The answer is absolutely "Yes."  I have never seen any written legal prohibition to the purchase or sale by anybody of anything, PROVIDED that it was within the law for that product to be sold or purchased. As an example, it was forbidden for anyone, minor or not, to sell guns or whiskey to 17th and 18th century Indians.

SO, anyone could sell or buy a slave, just as he/she could buy any other legal product. The problem to which you allude is that if that same minor, anytime and after becoming "of age", changed his mind for ANY reason, for a reasonable period of time AFTER he came of age he could disavow that purchase and require the man who sold him the slave to take the slave back and refund his money and often even his expenses.

So, you see, the problem was not in the legality of the sale or purchase, it was in the business difficulties that arose when such a sale was repudiated.  From that simple reality, everybody knew that a seller of anything to a minor ran the risk of having later to reimburse the minor when so requested.  

There were a number of exceptions recognized by most Southern courts.  A few were; if the child was yet underage but was married, emancipated, or in the army; if the goods sold were necessities to that minor in living his separate life; if the minor was orphaned of any others who could/would support him and was not a ward of the county/colony/state; and if there were other UNEQUIVOCAL and VERY GOOD LEGAL reasons for the seller to believe the minor to have been of age (very rarely recognized by the courts).

So, yes you could sell a slave to a minor, but be prepared to refund the money, no matter the condition of the slave when the man repudiated the sale.  It was said: "Seller beware if you sell anything to a kid".   Paul


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