REGULATORY DECREE of the Conseil du Cap, on the abuses, in matters of Religion, on the part of People of color

Having seen by the Conseil the Remonstrance made to it by the Procureur Général du Roi, stating that the gatherings of nègres, which concern both the maintenance of Police and good order and even public safety, had at all times been one of the principal objects of the Court’s attention; that, despite the severity of the penalties laid down in the Code Noir against gatherings, this Law had often been evaded by the cunning of the enslaved, who covered their assemblies with the veil of darkness and with that of Religion, by meeting at night in the Churches; that the Court, warned of this new kind of disorder, struck by the consequences it presented, and informed besides that by this means the Temples of God were becoming the passing refuge of fugitive nègres and often served as a stage for prostitution, had forbidden, by article IV of its Regulation of 7 April 1758, on pain of the whip and the fleur de lis, and of a heavier penalty in case of frequent repetition or other aggravating circumstances, enslaved nègres to assemble in the Churches after sunset.