Post-Treaty Practice in Jamaica

Following 1739, the British Government retained authority over Maroon communities and gradually passed laws that treated the Maroons on the same terms as other Jamaicans. This approach became more pronounced with the end of slavery in Jamaica in 1838. By 1956, in the Man O. Rowe Case, the Jamaican Court of Appeal held that Jamaican law was generally applicable in Maroon territories as elsewhere on the island. At the time of Jamaica’s independence in 1962, no special provisions concerning Maroons or Maroon sovereignty were contemplated in the Jamaican Constitution.