Okla-homey
3/6/2006, 06:55 AM
March 6, 1857 Supreme Court rules in Dred Scott case
On this day 149 years ago, in a 7-2 decision, the U.S. Supreme Court hands down its decision on Sandford v. Scott, a case that intensified national divisions over the issue of slavery.
http://img80.imageshack.us/img80/88/zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz5.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
Chief Justice Roger Taney of Maryland (a slave state) wrote the opinion
In 1834, Dred Scott, a slave, had been taken to Illinois, a free state, and then Wisconsin territory, where the Missouri Compromise of 1820 prohibited slavery. Scott lived in Wisconsin with his master, Dr. John Emerson, an Army surgeon, for several years before returning to Missouri, a slave state.
http://img122.imageshack.us/img122/8339/zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz15.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
Dred Scott. He died in 1858 about a year after the historic decision which bears his name.
In 1846, after Emerson died, Scott sued his master's widow for his freedom on the grounds that he had lived as a resident of a free state and territory. He won his suit in a lower court, but the Missouri supreme court reversed the decision.
Scott appealed the decision, and as his new "master" (to whom Scott had been leased,) John F.A. Sanford, was a resident of New York, a federal court decided to hear the case on the basis of the diversity of state citizenship represented. Note: The case went down in official Court records as Sandford v. Scott because a clerk misspelled appellee Sanford's name and the error was never corrected.
http://img80.imageshack.us/img80/3109/zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz6.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
From the National Archives
After a federal district court decided against Scott, the case came on appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, which was divided along slavery and antislavery lines; although the Southern justices had a majority.
http://img122.imageshack.us/img122/6973/zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz16.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
Map of pre-1860 US. Slave states in grey, free in pink. Organized territories in green.
During the trial, the antislavery justices used the case to defend the constitutionality of the Missouri Compromise, which had been repealed by the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854. The Southern majority responded by ruling on this day in 1857, that the Missouri Compromise was unconstitutional and that Congress had no power to prohibit slavery in the territories.
Three of the Southern justices also held that African Americans who were slaves or whose ancestors were slaves were not entitled to the rights of a federal citizen and therefore had no standing in court.
These rulings all confirmed that, in the view of the nation's highest court, under no condition did Dred Scott have the legal right to request his freedom. The Supreme Court's verdict further inflamed the irrepressible differences in America over the issue of slavery, which in 1861 erupted with the outbreak of the American Civil War.
Bottomline, the Court ruled that:
- No blacks, not even "free" blacks, could ever become citizens of the United States. They were "beings of an inferior order" not included in the phrase "all men" in the Declaration of Independence nor afforded any rights by the Constitution.
- The exclusion of slavery from a U.S. territory in the Missouri Compromise was an unconstitutional deprivation of property (Negro slaves) without due process prohibited by the Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution. IOW, if the law could deprive a slave owner of his property without "due process" that would constitute a violation of the 5th amendment. This is the first appearance in American constitutional law of the concept of "substantive due process," as opposed to "procedural" due process.
- Dred Scott was not free, because Missouri law alone applied after he returned there.
The matter was ultimately decided by ratification of the 13, 14 and 15th amendments to the Constitution in the wake of the Civil War which outlawed slavery, established citizenship of former slaves and bestowed upon them all the basic rights possessed by any other American citizen -- of course it was not until a hundred years later after the great civil rights struggles of the 1960's that these rights would become "real."
http://img364.imageshack.us/img364/9050/insane7zo8ag.jpg
On this day 149 years ago, in a 7-2 decision, the U.S. Supreme Court hands down its decision on Sandford v. Scott, a case that intensified national divisions over the issue of slavery.
http://img80.imageshack.us/img80/88/zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz5.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
Chief Justice Roger Taney of Maryland (a slave state) wrote the opinion
In 1834, Dred Scott, a slave, had been taken to Illinois, a free state, and then Wisconsin territory, where the Missouri Compromise of 1820 prohibited slavery. Scott lived in Wisconsin with his master, Dr. John Emerson, an Army surgeon, for several years before returning to Missouri, a slave state.
http://img122.imageshack.us/img122/8339/zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz15.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
Dred Scott. He died in 1858 about a year after the historic decision which bears his name.
In 1846, after Emerson died, Scott sued his master's widow for his freedom on the grounds that he had lived as a resident of a free state and territory. He won his suit in a lower court, but the Missouri supreme court reversed the decision.
Scott appealed the decision, and as his new "master" (to whom Scott had been leased,) John F.A. Sanford, was a resident of New York, a federal court decided to hear the case on the basis of the diversity of state citizenship represented. Note: The case went down in official Court records as Sandford v. Scott because a clerk misspelled appellee Sanford's name and the error was never corrected.
http://img80.imageshack.us/img80/3109/zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz6.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
From the National Archives
After a federal district court decided against Scott, the case came on appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, which was divided along slavery and antislavery lines; although the Southern justices had a majority.
http://img122.imageshack.us/img122/6973/zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz16.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
Map of pre-1860 US. Slave states in grey, free in pink. Organized territories in green.
During the trial, the antislavery justices used the case to defend the constitutionality of the Missouri Compromise, which had been repealed by the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854. The Southern majority responded by ruling on this day in 1857, that the Missouri Compromise was unconstitutional and that Congress had no power to prohibit slavery in the territories.
Three of the Southern justices also held that African Americans who were slaves or whose ancestors were slaves were not entitled to the rights of a federal citizen and therefore had no standing in court.
These rulings all confirmed that, in the view of the nation's highest court, under no condition did Dred Scott have the legal right to request his freedom. The Supreme Court's verdict further inflamed the irrepressible differences in America over the issue of slavery, which in 1861 erupted with the outbreak of the American Civil War.
Bottomline, the Court ruled that:
- No blacks, not even "free" blacks, could ever become citizens of the United States. They were "beings of an inferior order" not included in the phrase "all men" in the Declaration of Independence nor afforded any rights by the Constitution.
- The exclusion of slavery from a U.S. territory in the Missouri Compromise was an unconstitutional deprivation of property (Negro slaves) without due process prohibited by the Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution. IOW, if the law could deprive a slave owner of his property without "due process" that would constitute a violation of the 5th amendment. This is the first appearance in American constitutional law of the concept of "substantive due process," as opposed to "procedural" due process.
- Dred Scott was not free, because Missouri law alone applied after he returned there.
The matter was ultimately decided by ratification of the 13, 14 and 15th amendments to the Constitution in the wake of the Civil War which outlawed slavery, established citizenship of former slaves and bestowed upon them all the basic rights possessed by any other American citizen -- of course it was not until a hundred years later after the great civil rights struggles of the 1960's that these rights would become "real."
http://img364.imageshack.us/img364/9050/insane7zo8ag.jpg