Emancipation

(e-man-se-pā'shun.) [From L. emancipatio, a selling out of.] (Law.) Under the Roman code, the setting free as on from subjection to his father. It differed from manumi ion, inasmuch that the latter was the act of a master in favor of a slave, whereas E. placed the son in a position to control his own affairs, and to marry without the paternal consent, although a minor.-(Hist.) In a politico-historic sense, the term E.applies particularly to such great works of human progre as the liberation of the negroes from Christian slavery; the restoration to freedom of the serfs in Ru ia; and the abolition of the civil disabilities of Roman Catholics in Great Britain. [s. 327]