Why did the abolitionists think that the Supreme Court's Dred Scott decision was a setback?

Answer 1

The Supreme Court held that Dred Scott (a freed slave) was not a citizen and not entitled to sue in federal court. The Chief Justice that wrote the opinion said that Black people could never be US citizens because of their race.

This infuriated the abolitionists who believed slavery was immoral and illegal. There was nothing the abolitionists could do to alter the Court's decision.

Answer 2

The Abolitionists (those who opposed slavery and wanted it outlawed) were outraged at the Supreme Court's decision that slavery was protected by the Fifth Amendment of the Constitution, and also by their suggestion that African-Americans had no right of citizenship or access to the courts.

Abolitionists objected to the Supreme Court decision for a number of reasons:

1. The Court held that "A free negro of the African race, whose ancestors were brought to this country and sold as slaves, is not a "citizen" within the meaning of the Constitution of the United States." As a result, African-Americans were unable to claim state citizenship anywhere within the United States. This revoked their right to sue for freedom in any court, a practice that had been a critical and somewhat successful way for slaves who had lived in "free" states to become emancipated under the "once free, always free" doctrine.
2. The Court also abolished the "once free, always free" standard, replacing it with a concept more akin to "once enslaved, always enslaved" when it labeled slaves chattel (property), giving owners Fifth Amendment (Taking Clause) protection.
3. The Court declared the Missouri Compromise of 1820, legislation that sought to prevent the establishment of slave-holding states in the western and northwestern territories, unconstitutional. According to Chief Justice Taney, Congress lacked the authority to deprive states of the right to regulate this aspect of their economy, or to deprive individuals of their property. Not only did nullifying the Missouri Compromise subordinate the power of the federal government to the slave-holding states and allow for the free spread of slavery, it was also one of the catalysts for the Civil War.
4. The Court decision undermined the right of states' and developing territories' citizens to exclude slavery from their soil, virtually eradicating the concept of "popular sovereignty," which many abolitionists hoped would allow citizens to establish anti-slavery territories.
5. The Court's decision deprived slaves entering "free" states the right to emancipation from their owners by virtue of being in a state that outlawed slavery, under the Fifth Amendment Takings Clause.
6. The Court sanctioned the practice of slave-holders tracking runaway slaves to free states and returning them to their masters, undermining the efforts of certain state courts and abolitionists to have the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 declared unconstitutional.
7. The Court ruling held that children born in free states to people declared slaves were also slaves.
8. The Court also indirectly sanctioned continued violence against slaves.
9. As one journalist wrote: "They converted the Supreme Court of Law and Equity of the United States of America into a propagandist of human Slavery." and perverted the meaning of the Constitution.
10. The decision was immoral, inhumane, perverse and cruel to anyone who valued human beings and believed freedom and constitutional rights should extend to all.
11. They were outraged at the Supreme Court's verdict that the Constitution protected a man's property, and that slaves counted as property.
12. They were also offended at the further suggestion that a black man should not really be taking a white man to court.

Case Citation:

Dred Scott v. Sanford, 60 US 393 (1857)

Answer 3

The Dred Scott ruling (1857) said that no African slave descendant could be a US citizen, and that slaves were property, not persons with their own rights. This directly conflicted with the priniciple of freedom that the abolitionists saw in the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence ("all men are created equal"). It was not until the 14th Amendment (1865) that slavery was constitutionally outlawed, after the South had been defeated in the Civil War.

Answer 4

Abolitionists were strongly opposed to the US Supreme Court's decision in the Dred Scott case. The abolitionist movement was to abolish slavery and the Court basically declared that slaves were property. Not a good sign for all anti-slavery people. However, despite all the negatives that went written down in the decision, the abolitionists always had hope. Their hope was based on the amendment process outlined in the Constitution itself. As was seen after the US Civil War, three amendments changed the law and slavery was abolished in December of 1865 by the 13th Amendment.

Answer 5

People had to vote if they wanted slavery or not.