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 Belonos 3that 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...
