Upper Canada passes British Empire’s first legislation against slavery
An Act to Prevent the further Introduction of Slaves and to limit the Term of Contracts for Servitude, Statutes of Upper Canada, 33 George III, Cap. 7, 1793. Archives of Ontario
July 9, 1793
On July 9, 1793, the Act Against Slavery was passed, beginning the gradual abolition of slavery in Upper Canada and prohibiting the importation of slaves into the province. The act was Lieutenant-Governor John Graves Simcoe’s response to an incident in which Chloe Cooley, an enslaved Black woman in Queenston, Upper Canada, fiercely resisted being transported by force across the Niagara River and into the hands of her American owner. The act was the first legislation to limit slavery in the British Empire.
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