Professor Damon Fordham discusses Freeman's personality, and some of the background of her situation. (How Elizabeth Freeman Helped End Slavery, 2015, Youtube)
In 1744, Elizabeth Freeman was born as Mum Bett, a slave in New York. Her original owner’s daughter married John Ashley, a colonel in the American Revolution, and took Bett with her to Sheffield, Massachusetts. The Ashley’s were active in politics at the time, so Bett was subject to a lot of debate about independence during the Revolution. This caused her to begin to seriously consider the hypocrisy of slavery at that time. She approached a lawyer, Theodore Sedgwick, and questioned him regarding the statement in Massachusetts’ constitution of all men being free and equal. After some discourse, Sedgwick, impressed by her resolve, agreed to take up her case for freedom.
Sedgwick was a prominent lawyer in Sheffield, Massachusetts at the time of the case. (Theodore Sedgwick, 1808, Museum of Fine Arts Boston, Massachusetts)
Sedgwick enlisted the help of Tapping Reeve to argue the case and added another slave of the Ashley’s, Brom, to the suit. Brom and Bett v. Ashley was heard in late 1781. Sedgwick argued that slavery was illegal because the Massachusetts’ Constitution stated in Article I that, “All men are born free and equal, and have certain natural, essential, and unalienable rights; among which may be reckoned the right of enjoying and defending their lives and liberties […] and obtaining their safety and happiness”. The jury agreed, and Ashley was required to pay reparations to the two newly-freed slaves. Upon winning her freedom, Bett changed her name to Elizabeth Freeman.