A Nod to Black History Month

I don't usually write about the law in this space, but I came across a case this week that so took me aback that I had to share it. I've been researching the law of bailments for work lately (for the uninitiated, a bailment is a loan or temporary deposit of something; coat checks are a classic example). As part of that research I read Miller v. Dyer, 243 Ark. 981 (1968). The plaintiff was suing over damage to a truck that he had rented out. As courts will do, the court looked for analogies in prior case law:

[A]n express agreement by bailee to return the bailed property imposes no greater liability upon the bailee than is implied in every bailment. Yet, this court has held that one who hired a slave upon a written contract that, in addition to providing for payment for the slave's service, required his return at the end of the year, was liable for failure to return him because of the slave's escape without fault of the hirer.

So the state supreme court thought that loaning out your truck was kind of like loaning out your slave. In 1968. Real classy, Arkansas.