FREEMAN

This word· has had various meanings at different stages of history. In the Roman law, 1t denoted one who was either born free or emancipated, and was the opposite of "slave." In feudal law, it designated an allodlal proprietor, as distinguished from a va al or feudal tenant. (And so in Pennsylvania colonial law. Fry's Election Case, 71 Pa. 308, 10 Am. Rep. 698.) In old English law, the word described a freeholder or tenant by free services; one who was not a villein. In modern legal phraseology, it is the appellation of a member of a city _or borough having the right of suffrage, or a member of any municipal corporation invested with full civic rights. A person in the Po e ion and enjoyment of all the civil and political rights accorded to the people under a free government. -Free in an'• rolL · A list of persons admitted as burge es or freemen for the purposes of the rights rese"ed b;r the municipal corporation. act, (5 & 6 Wm. IV. c. 76.) Distinguished from the Burge Roll. 8 Steph. Comm. 197. The term was used, in early colonial history, in some of the American colonies.. - [s. 530]