Why was the Supreme Court decision in the Dred Scott case so controversial?

Answer 1

The Northerners were outraged because the Supreme Court's ruling held that slavery was protected by the Fifth Amendment. Plus, they were upset by the holding that black people were not entitled to sue in federal court because they were not citizens, but 3/5 of a white person. Slavery was not practiced in the north.

Answer 2

The Chief Justice chose to put the clock back and interpret the Constitution in the spirit in which the founding fathers had written it.

This did not envisage a black man having the right to sue a white man.

It also re-asserted that a man's property was sacred, including slave property - which had also been taken as read in 1776.

Naturally the Supreme Court decision delighted the South, as it appeared to mean that slavery could not be outlawed in any state of the Union. But the Abolitionists saw it as a terrible setback and it deepened the divisions between the two sections.

Answer 3

Because it rendered all the Compromises invalid by declaring that slavery was legal in every state of the Union according to the Constitution, as the Founding Fathers would have meant it. (A man's property was sacred, and they would have included slaves as property.)

It also angered the Abolitionists by declaring that a black man was not the sort of person who ought to be suing a white man in the first place.