 Quite apart from the moral considerations, there was an obvious conflict between the mercantile custom of recognizing property in slaves and the English tradition of freedom protected by "habeas corpus".If the courts acknowledged the property which was generally assumed to exist in slaves in the colonies, how would such property rights be treated if a slave was subsequently brought to England?However, the decisions of Holt had caused sufficient consternation as to the legal status of slaves that some slave owners sought clarity of the law.