Dred Scott Decision Still Resonates Today [March 6, 1857]

national Constitution Center ^ | March 6 2016

[iowamark]

On March 6, 1857, the Supreme Court handed down its decision in the Dred Scott case, which had a direct impact on the coming of the Civil War and Abraham Lincoln’s presidency four years later.

The case of Dred Scott v. Sandford was one of the most controversial decisions in the court’s history. At the time, the Supreme Court’s majority came from pro-slavery states or had connections to pro-slavery presidents.

The case had been in the court system for more than a decade. Scott had been born into slavery in 1795. In subsequent years, he lived in two parts of the United States that didn’t allow slavery, Illinois and Wisconsin, along with his master.

When his current master died in 1846, Scott filed suit on behalf of himself and his wife, also a slave, to gain their freedom. The case was heard by three other courts as it made its way to Washington.

The Dred Scott decision came just two days after President James Buchanan took office, and it set the tone for his controversial term that led to the Civil War.

Chief Justice Roger Taney gave the court’s opinion; it had ruled 7-2 against Scott.

Taney announced that slaves were not citizens of the United States and had no rights to sue in federal courts, and in fact, blacks couldn’t be citizens.

“There are two clauses in the Constitution which point directly and specifically to the negro race as a separate class of persons, and show clearly that they were not regarded as a portion of the people or citizens of the Government then formed,” Taney argued.

The court also declared the Missouri Compromise of 1820 to be unconstitutional. And it said that Congress did not have the authority to prohibit slavery in the territories.

The decision was celebrated in the South and by slavery supporters. There was outrage in the North and among abolitionists.

One person who was publicly upset with the Dred Scott decision was Lincoln, who was a rising figure in the newly formed Republican Party. The Dred Scott case was a focal point of the famous debates between Lincoln and Stephen Douglas in 1858.

The decision also made the Republican Party a national force, and led to the division of the Democratic Party during the 1860 presidential elections.

The growing power of the Republicans, who received considerable support from the northern states, directly led to fears in the South that slavery would be ended, and those fears started the momentum for secession and the Civil War.

Scott died in 1858 about a year after he and his family had gained their freedom, when his owner (under pressure from her husband) sent the Scotts back to their original owners, who promptly freed them.

Taney passed away in 1864. A year later, a request to include a bust of Taney in a hall that recognized chief justices was blocked by Republicans.

“I declare that the opinion of the chief justice in the case of Dred Scott was more thoroughly abominable than anything of the kind in the history of courts. Judicial baseness reached its lowest point on that occasion,” said Charles Sumner, a leading Radical Republican.

Sumner had been brutally beaten and almost killed on the Senate floor in 1856 when he made antislavery remarks. His attacker was Representative Preston Brooks of South Carolina.

After the Civil War, the 13th Amendment and 14th Amendment effectively overturned the Dred Scott decision.

Today, the words “Dred Scott” are tossed out by politicians when they vehemently try to link a recent Supreme Court decision to a historically bad precedent. In 2010, for example, some critics compared the Citizens United v. FEC decision to it.

In 2007, Lynne Jackson, Scott’s great-great-granddaughter, told NPR on the 150th anniversary of the decision that the lesson from the case is that people should try to do what is right.

“Even if it doesn’t look like it’s going to work out, in the end, it usually does,” she said.

[rockrr]

It was taney who was the activist judge who unilaterally decided who was a person and who was merely property. It was taney who wrote that blacks “had no rights which the white man was bound to respect; and that the negro might justly and lawfully be reduced to slavery for his benefit. He was bought and sold and treated as an ordinary article of merchandise and traffic, whenever profit could be made by it.”

So, for taney the circumstance of ones birth meant more than substance of his soul and a white man could rise above his condition and achieve freedom and equality but a man of darker skin could not. Not only that but (according to taney) those who thought the practice barbaric were invited to STFD and STFU. Northern states were prohibited to ban the practice in their own communities.

Dred v. Scott stands as one of the most flawed and obscene decisions ever rendered.

[minnesota_bound]

Replace Roger Taney with other judges names like John Roberts and you see not much has changed. I bet someone slip some money to those judges back then just like with today’s judges.

What are millions of lives ruined if you can make a quick buck?.....

[drop 50 and fire for effect]

Here are two for your review:

https://en.m.wikisource.org/wiki/Dred_Scott_v._Sandford/Dissent_Curtis

https://en.m.wikisource.org/wiki/Dred_Scott_v._Sandford/Dissent_McLean

Unfortunately, I don’t have time to discuss this in detail, however they both dissect the majority opinion and Curtis does discuss the territory issue. He resigned from the court shortly after the decision, in large part feeling that Taney had tainted the court.

The facts of the case blurred the impact and Taney and the majority went beyond the facts to state that Blacks could never be citizens, despite ample precedent to the contrary.

[fieldmarshaldj]

On the Senate floor, not the House. It is a falsehood in most historical accounts that Sen. Sumner, a demagogue who was anxious for war, was “heroically” denouncing slavery when it was a speech explicitly directed towards Sen. Andrew Pickens Butler where he was insulting him viciously... and doing so while Butler was not present to respond. It was in poor taste to begin with and Sen. Stephen Douglas, who was watching the speech in progress, was so offended that he thought that “damn fool (Sumner)” was getting to get killed.

During the speech, someone went and alerted Preston Brooks in the House about Sumner’s insults. Also, the “response” by Brooks didn’t occur immediately. He mulled over potential responses, and decided that challenging Sumner to a duel was a no-go, because that could only be fought by gentlemen. Since Sumner’s vile language was proof positive he was no gentleman, and more that of a lowly cad or cur, the proper reply to him was to administer a vigorous thrashing, and hence was delivered by Brooks’s gutta-percha cane (which broke during the thrashing — and for which he received numerous replacements from supporters afterwards).

[Ditto]

LBJ, A negro community organizer from Chicago, JFK, FDR, Woodrow Wilson. (I liked Ivan the Terrible as he nailed the cap on the head of a peasant who failed to bow.) No one ever claims any form of government is perfect but some are better than others and a well functioning nobility is best. Democracy is worst. Monarchy in the middle.

As long as the trains run on time... right? Who gives a crap about that life, liberty and pursuit of happiness BS. Right?

What the hell are you doing of a site called Free Republic if you think that heredity nobility and Monarchies are OK? Do you even know what the word Republic means? I doubt it.

[riverdawg]

Thanks for the correction and for posting a more complete account. Here is a link to Brooks’ resignation speech in which he defends his attack on Sumner and points out that the House had no jurisdiction over his actions as they occurred (as you point out) on the floor of the Senate, not the House.

http://www.bartleby.com/268/9/15.html

[fieldmarshaldj]

The last time I got in a discussion on this issue, I had some crazies attacking me for daring to defend Brooks’s actions. I just loathe that this is one of the most one-sided and distorted points of history reported on. Sen. Charles Sumner was one of the more shameful individuals to have served in elective office. He probably did more to foment sectional hatred and toss gasoline on the fire to bring on a Civil War than anyone else, instead of using his capacity to find a peaceful solution to the issue of slavery and acting like a real statesman and gentleman.

[AEMILIUS PAULUS]

I said "Democracy" is the worst not Republic. Compare Periclean Athens with the Rome of Brutus. Rome was a Republic run by nobles and it worked fine for about 200 years. In our early history we were governed by a de facto nobility and we became great. Today we are a Democracy and are dying.

You are an egalitarian, I'm not.

[AEMILIUS PAULUS]

By the way go read the works of Alexander Hamilton and the founders of our nation-”The Mob” was not their favorite.

[BroJoeK]

AEMILIUS PAULUS: "No one ever claims any form of government is perfect but some are better than others and a well functioning nobility is best.
Democracy is worst.
Monarchy in the middle."

Curious that you don't mention a constitutional republican form of government, such as... oh, I don't know... how about the United States?

Where does constitutional republic fit into your grand scheme, sir?

[AEMILIUS PAULUS]

Our “Constitutional Republic” lasted up to and including the Civil War. The outcome of the Civil War ensured a Democracy, the source of our present ongoing collapse. Republic to Democracy Democracy to “The Mob.” We are there.

[BroJoeK]

drop 50 and fire for effect: "Taney and the majority went beyond the facts to state that Blacks could never be citizens, despite ample precedent to the contrary."

Fort Sill FDC school greetings, sir.
You have a great screen name & wonderful tag line, welcome to Free Republic.
Thanks for your contributions, and your service, please come back.

[DiogenesLamp]

https://en.m.wikisource.org/wiki/Dred_Scott_v._Sandford/Dissent_Curtis

Read through some of it. First argument he puts forth is all procedural.

I get to the point where he points out that Free Blacks were citizens. Yes they were, and I do not and never have disputed this. Tanney is wrong about that, but not about his larger point.

Neither the Declaration of Independence nor the US Constitution were intended to apply to slaves.

There may be some valid points in the Curtis and McLean dissents, but rather than wade through their lengthy statement, could you just encapsulate their strongest argument for me?

[BroJoeK]

AEMILIUS PAULUS: "Our “Constitutional Republic” lasted up to and including the Civil War.
The outcome of the Civil War ensured a Democracy"

Even today the US is far from "pure democracy", and indeed the most common complaint is that rich and powerful have too much influence in government, suppressing votes of average citizens.
In fact, basic legal forms of our constitutional republic have been consistently followed, in letter even when not in spirit.

But more to your point about the Civil War, you are conflating much later events -- i.e., the "progressive era" -- with the Civil War itself.
In fact, the Civil War itself produced only three constitutional amendments -- 13th, 14th & 15th -- which were intended to do nothing more than extend normal rights of citizenship to all slaves and freed blacks.

[DiogenesLamp]

Curious that you don't mention a constitutional republican form of government, such as... oh, I don't know... how about the United States?

Where does constitutional republic fit into your grand scheme, sir?

Wasn't that destroyed in 1861?

[BroJoeK]

DiogenesLamp referring to the US constitutional republic: "Wasn't that destroyed in 1861?"

Yes, seriously damaged by Fire Eating secessionists, in stages beginning December 20, 1860, culminating on April 12 and May 6, 1861.
Restored by unconditional surrender on April 9, 1865

[Jim Noble]

Dred Scott Decision Still Resonates Today [March 6, 1857]

Blacks are still not allowed to be US citizens?

[Jim Noble]

Where I live it is no defense to a charge of assault that one has insulted his assailant´s relative

And that's a shame.

[AEMILIUS PAULUS]

You have not grasp what is happening to us. The Mob elected a negro community organizer from Chicago as President who has governed without resistance. He has succeeded in “Transforming America into a Third World Mobocracy. The Mob is raising up “Bernie” a politician dedicated to leveling everyone. The Mob is raising up Hillary a crook of the first magnitude. She has guaranteed to level everyone excepting those that give her money. WAKE UP! The issue is no longer theoretical academic exercises on Republics, Democracies, etc. etc. It is survival and we are loosing.

[DiogenesLamp]

But more to your point about the Civil War, you are conflating much later events -- i.e., the "progressive era" -- with the Civil War itself.

Was not the Civil War the birth of the "Progressive" movement? Certainly all the agitators before and after the Civil War went on to push for Women's Suffrage, Prohibition, and the various other aspects of what Historians dub the "Progressive era".

But more to your point about the Civil War, you are conflating much later events -- i.e., the "progressive era" -- with the Civil War itself.

According to Lincoln, started by this North Eastern Liberal Progressive author.

What was the abolition movement but a "Progressive" movement? Weren't they the original "Social Justice Warriors"?

In fact, the Civil War itself produced only three constitutional amendments -- 13th, 14th & 15th -- which were intended to do nothing more than extend normal rights of citizenship to all slaves and freed blacks.

But which turned out to be terrible mistakes for a Constitutional Republic. The 14th is so badly worded that it means whatever a Judge feels like claiming it to mean.

From the 14th, we've gotten Abortion, Gay Marriage, Bans on Religion, forced Busing, and a whole host of other nonsensical anti-Republican doctrines and practices.

And we haven't even discussed the legitimacy of amendments passed by pointing guns at people's heads and telling them they must vote for them.

Those Amendments could not have passed without those guns being pointed at those heads.