Elizabeth Freeman

Elizabeth Freeman ( 1744 - December 28, 1829), also known as Mumbet, was one of the first enslaved African Americans to file and win a freedom suit in Massachusetts. The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court ruling, in Freeman's favor, found slavery to be inconsistent with the 1780 Constitution of Massachusetts. Her suit, ''Brom and Bett v. Ashley'' (1781), was cited in the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court appellate review of Quock Walker's freedom suit. When the court upheld Walker's freedom under the state's constitution, the ruling was considered to have implicitly ended slavery in Massachusetts.

Freeman was fighting for her freedom in the state where the legalization of slavery in early America first derives from. The northern United States, along with the south, engaged in harsh treatment of Black people, with Massachusetts even considering  “slavery as a way of life” until 1788.

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