James Iredell, A Digested Manual of the Acts of the General Assembly of North Carolina, from the Year 1838 to the Year 1846, Inclusive, Omitting All the Acts of a Private and Local Nature, and Such as were Temporary and Whose Operation Has Ceased to Exist Page 73, Image 73 (1847) available at The Making of Modern Law: Primary Sources.

Crimes and Punishments, 1840 – 1. – Ch. 30, If any free negro, mulatto, or free person of color shall wear, or carry about his or her person, or keep in his or her house, any shot gun, musket, rifle, pistol, sword, dagger, or bowie knife, unless he or she shall have obtained a license therefor from the Court of Pleas and Quarter Sessions of his or her county, within one year preceding the wearing, keeping or carrying thereof, he or she shall be guilty of a misdemeanor and may be indicted therefor.