Dred Scott Case Essay, Research Paper

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Staci Belonos

Ms. Bovian

American Government

18 November 2000

The Dred Scott Decision

The Dred Scott decision of the Supreme Court in March 1857 was one of the major steps on the road to secession. Dred Scott was a slave who was taken to Missouri from Virginia and sold. His new master then moved to Illinois (a free state) for a while but soon moved back to Missouri. Upon his master’s death, Scott claimed that since he had resided in a free state, he was consequentially a free man. The case eventually made it to the Supreme Court.

As stated by Supreme Court Justice C. J. Taney, “In considering this…controversy, two questions arise: 1st was Scott, together with his family, free in Missouri by reason of his stay in the territory of the United States earlier mentioned. 2nd If they were not, is Scott himself free by reason of his removal to Rock Island, in the state of Illinois…?” Both of these questions led to an even greater and more central question: “Can a Negro, whose ancestors were imported into this country, and sold as slaves, become a member of the political community formed and brought into existence by the Constitution of the United States, and as such become entitled to all the rights, and privileges, and immunities, guarantied by that instrument to the citizen?”

The Court’s decision (7 against, 2 for) was declared on March 6, 1857. Due to the variance of opinions on why the Court decided as they did (all seven justices who decided against Scott wrote opinion papers for the case), the opinion of Justice Taney is generally cited for the majority. According to Taney, the Court decided that Scott (and hence all Negro slaves or

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their descendants) was not a citizen of the United States or the state of Missouri, and thus not entitled to sue in the federal courts. Justice Taney then went beyond this point and ruled on the entire issue of slavery in federal territories, claiming that slaves were property and therefore the Missouri Compromise was unconstitutional.

Most people, whether for or against the decision, viewed it as a political decision and not a legal one. For the first time since Marbury vs. Madison in 1803 (and only the second time ever) the Supreme Court declared an act of Congress [the Missouri Compromise] null and void. The decision also lowered the Court’s prestige in the North and widened the sectional cleavage by moving Southerners from the position that slavery could not be kept out of the territories to the assertion that it must be protected in them.

This information comes from “Dred Scott,” By Robert J. Steamer, Academic American Encyclopedia. Grolier Electronic Publishing, Danbury, 1995.

The decision of the Supreme Court of the United States in Dred Scott v. Sandford (1857) held that a black slave could not become a citizen under the U.S. Constitution.

Dred Scott (c.1795-1858), a slave in Missouri, had been taken by his owner, John Emerson, into Illinois, where slavery had been prohibited by the Northwest Ordinance of 1787, and into the Louisiana Territory, where slavery was forbidden by the MISSOURI COMPROMISE.

After his return to Missouri, Scott brought suit (1846) against Emerson’s widow, claiming that he was free by reason of his residence in free territory. The Missouri supreme court ruled against him, but after his ownership was transferred to Mrs. Emerson’s brother, John F. A. Sanford (the name was misspelled in legal records) of New York, Scott brought a similar suit in federal court. The decision of the Supreme Court of the United States in Dred Scott v. Sandford (1857) held that a black slave could not become a citizen under the U.S. Constitution based on

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that Scott had not become free by virtue of his residence in a territory covered by the Missouri Compromise, since that legislation was unconstitutional.

This was viewed as a proslavery decision by the abolitionists, and the case probably hastened the coming of the Civil War. That issue aside, it was the second time that the Court had declared an act of Congress unconstitutional, the first having occurred 54 years earlier, in MARBURY V. MADISON.

Dred Scott v. Sandford

The slavery debate presented supporters and opponents of the institution with two very important questions: how should fugitives from slavery be treated in jurisdictions where slavery was illegal, and should a slave brought into a free state by his master be viewed as free?

The first question was partially addressed by Article IV, Section 2 of the Constitution and by the Fugitive Slave Acts of 1793 and 1850; however the second question had not as yet been addressed.

During the 1830s and 1840s a slave by the name of Dred Scott accompanied his master, a surgeon in the U.S. Army, on numerous trips to military posts around the country, including the free states of Illinois and the territory of Wisconsin. In 1846 Scott sued his master for his freedom, asserting that his sojourns in free jurisdictions made him free. After numerous delays, trials, and retrials, the case reached the Supreme Court in 1856. The court responded with nine separate opinions, and Chief Justice Roger Brook Taney delivered the deciding opinion.

The ruling was both complex and controversial: the Missouri Compromise of 1820 was ruled unconstitutional on the grounds that Congress did not have authority to limit the expansion of slavery; slavery was found to be legal in the territories until the citizens voted for or against- it; and Africans and their descendants were found to be ineligible for citizenship in the United States as the framers of the Constitution had not viewed Africans as citizens. Since African

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Americans were not viewed by the court as citizens, they could not file suit. Despite the finality of the court’s decision, the issue of slavery remained unresolved.

The story of the Missouri slave Dred Scott and his quest for freedom is one of the least known and yet most influential from the turbulent years leading up to the Abraham Lincoln would be elected President.

The Early Years: 1809 – 1833

DRED SCOTT, Plaintiff in Error,

V.

JOHN F. A. SANFORD.

Plea in abatement, when may be reviewed — the word “citizen” in the Constitution does not embrace one of the Negro race — Negro cannot become a citizen — slave not made free by residence in a free state or territory — Declaration of Independence does not include slaves as part of the people — the rights and privileges conferred by the Constitution upon citizens do not apply to the Negro race — Constitution should have the meaning intended when it was adopted — court may examine other errors besides plea in abatement — Constitution expressly affirms right of property in slaves — Missouri compromise unconstitutional and void.

Where a plea in abatement, by defendant, to the jurisdiction of the court below is overruled on demurrer, and the defendant thereupon pleads in bar upon which issues were joined and the trial and verdict were in his favor, and the plaintiff thereupon brought the case into this court by writ of error, and the plea and demurrer below upon it are part of the record; held, that this court has power to review the decision of the court below upon the plea in abatement.

It is therefore the duty of the court to decide whether the facts stated in the plea, are or are not sufficient to show that the plaintiff is not entitled to sue as a citizen in the court of the United States.

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The provisions of the Constitution of the United States in relation to the personal rights and privileges to which the citizens of a state should be entitled do not embrace the Negro African race, at that time in this country, or who might afterwards be imported, who had then been or should afterwards be made free in any state.

Such provisions of the Constitution do not put it in the power of a single state to make out one of the Negro African race a citizen of the United States, and to endue him with the full rights of citizenship in every other state without their consent.

The Constitution of the United States does not act upon one of the Negro race whenever he shall be made free under the laws of a state, and raise him to the rank of a citizen, and immediately clothe him with all the privileges of a citizen of any other state, and in its own courts.

The plaintiff in error was a Negro slave, and brought into a free State (Illinois), and in the free territory of the United States for about four years, during which time he was married to another Negro slave who also was in said free territory. One of their children (Eliza) was born on the River Mississippi, and another of their children was born in the State of Missouri, to which state he had returned.

Held, that the plaintiff in error could not be and was not a citizen of the State of Missouri, within the meaning of the Constitution of the United States, and consequently was not entitled to sue in its courts.

The legislation and histories of the times, and the language used in the Declaration of Independence, show that neither the class of persons who had been imported as shaves nor their descendents, whether they had become free or not, where then acknowledged as part of the people, nor intended to be included in the general words used in that instrument.

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The descendents of Africans who were imported into this country and sold as slaves, when they shall become emancipated, or who are born of parents who had become free before their birth, are not citizens of a state in the sense in which the word “citizen” is used in Constitution of the United States.

The enslaved African race was not intended to be included in, and formed no part of, the people who formed and adopted the Declaration of Independence.

When the framers of the Constitution were conferring special rights and privileges upon the citizens of a state in every other part of the Union, it is impossible to believe that these rights and privileges were intended to be extended to the Negro race.

The words of the Constitution should be given the meaning they were intended to bear, when that instrument was framed and adopted.

Where this court has decided against the jurisdiction of the Circuit Court on a plea of abatement, it has still the right to examine any question presented by exculpation or by the record, and may reverse the judgment for errors committed, and remand the case to the Circuit Court for it to dismiss the case for want of jurisdiction.

The right of property in a slave is distinctly and expressly affirmed in the Constitution.

The Act of Congress which prohibited a citizen from holding and owning property of this kind in the territory of the United States north of the line therein mentioned (thirty-six degrees thirty minutes north latitude), is not warranted by the Constitution, and is therefore void.

Neither Dred Scott himself, nor any of his family were made free by being carried into such territory; even if they had been carried their by their owner with the intention of becoming permanent residents.

Scott was not made free by being taken to Rock Island in the State of Illinois. As Scott was a slave when taken into the State of Illinois by his owner, and was there held as such, and

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brought back into Missouri in that character, his status, as free or slave, depended on the laws of Missouri and not of Illinois. He and his family were not free, but were, by the laws of Missouri, the property of defendant.

On November 2, 1853, Dred Scott, by his attorney, filed in the clerk’s office of the Circuit Court of the United States for the District of Missouri, the following declaration against the defendant, John F. A. Sanford:

Dred Scott, of St. Louis, in the State of Missouri, and a citizen of the State of Missouri, complains of John F. A. Sandford, of the City of New York, and a citizen of the State of New York, in the plea of trespass for that the defendant heretofore, to wit: on the 1st day of January, A. D. 1853, at St. Louis in the County of St. Louis and State of Missouri, with force and arms assaulted the plaintiff, and without law or right held him as a slave, and imprisoned him for the space of six hours and more, and then and there did threaten to beat the plaintiff and to hold him in prison, and restrained of his liberty, so that by means of such threats the plaintiff was put in fear and could not attend to his business, and thereby lost great gains and profits which he might have made and otherwise would have made in the prosecution of his business, to wit: $2,500, and other wrongs to the plaintiff then and there did, against the peace and to the damage of the plaintiff $3,000.

And also for that the defendant heretofore on the 1st day of January A. D. 1853, with force and arms at St. Louis aforesaid, an assault did make on Harriet Scott, then and still the wife of the plaintiff, and then and there did imprison Harriet, and hold her as a slave, without law or right, for the space of six hours, and then and there did threaten to beat said Harriet and hold her as a slave, so that by means of the premises said Harriet was put in great fear and pain and could not and did not attend to the plaintiff’s business, and the plaintiff lost and was deprived of the society, comfort and assistance of said wife, and thereby lost great gains and profits, of the value,

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to wit: of $2,500, and other wrongs to the plaintiff, the defendant then and there did, against the peace and to the plaintiff’s damage, $3,000.

And also for that the defended heretofore, to wit: on the 1st day of January, A. D. 1853, with force and arms at St. Louis aforesaid made an assault on Eliza Scott and Lizzie Scott, then and still infant daughters and servants of the plaintiff, and then and there imprisoned and held as slaves said Eliza and Lizzie, for a long space of time, to wit: six hours, and then and there did threaten to beat said Eliza and Lizzie and hold them as slaves and restrained of their liberty, so that by means of the premises, said Eliza and Lizzie were put in great fear and could not and did not attend to plaintiff’s business as otherwise they might and would have done, and the plaintiff thereby lost the comfort, society, service and assistance of his said children and servants, of great value, to wit: $2,500, and other wrongs to the plaintiff $3,000, and the plaintiff on account of the aforesaid several grievances, brings suit, etc. by his attorney