Did Maine allow slavery A long ago?

Fortunately, it was in 1783 that the Massachusetts Supreme Court ruled that a clause in the state constitution that regarded all men as "free and equal" made slavery illegal. Unlike slaves in the South, slaves that did exist in Maine had the legal right to testify in court. Further, owners could be brought to trial for mistreatment of their slaves. The case has been made that this proves slave life was better in the North than the South. Slavery was legal in Maine until 1783 because Maine was a part of Massachusetts until 1820. Although slavery was not as widely practiced in the north, first slaves in Massachusetts and what is now Maine, arrived in 1630. It is agreed, in 1820 that the district of Maine was separated from Massachusetts to become an independent free state, the 23rd in the union, which was known as the Missouri Compromise, that allowed Maine to be a free state and Missouri to be a slavery state. Most communities and towns in Maine weren't founded until after 1790, so slavery only existed in the earliest settled towns and cities of Maine. According to a report in Maine Historical Weekly, in 1987, there were never more than 500 slaves in all Maine state history.

Around 1795, the anti-slavery movement was growing in the North, including Maine, with the black community serving as the backbone of the cause. In Portland, the center of the community was the Abyssinian Church on Newbury Street. William Lloyd Garrison, the publisher of the abolitionist newspaper The Liberator, and one of the most outspoken, uncompromising voices against slavery, made one of several speeches in Portland at the church. On this trip through Maine, Garrison also spoke at the First Parish Church on Commercial Street (whose pastor 60 years back was a slaveowner) and the Quaker meeting house which stood where Lincoln Park is today, across from the County Courthouse. Garrison often urged local citizens and churches to hide runaway slaves.

The most ardent, or perhaps the most daring, members of the abolitionist movement participated in the Underground Railroad, the system of people and resources that helped runaway slaves escape to free states and Canada. According to Staley-Mays, between 100,000 and half a million slaves escaped on the Underground Railroad and among these numbers, tens of thousands came through Portland. (Staley-Mays has recently begun offering tours of the Underground Railroad as it manifested itself in Portland.)

People who housed runaway slaves were known as conductors, and Portland was home to many who risked imprisonment to help runaways. One, Elizabeth Thomas, was a white woman who lived on India Street and is buried in the Eastern Cemetery. Another was George Ropes, a black man who lived on Oxford Street.