Makoa YoshidaMr. Duggan

AP US History Pd. 310/27/14

The Implications of the Dred Scott Decision (1865)

The Dred Scott decision of 1865 had many implications on the status of free

blacks in the United States, along with the concept of popular sovereignty, and the future

of slavery in America. Dred Scott was a slave who moved in with his master in Illinois, a

free state. He claimed residence in a free state made him a free man and fought for his

freedom all the way up to the Supreme Court. It was ruled that since blacks can not be

citizens, they had no right to sue in a federal court.

The decision made by the court greatly affected the status on free blacks in the

United States because it did not allow them any rights as a citizen, disabling them from

advancing in society. They could not do anything because the constitution did not apply

to them. This created a lot of confusion and set up a problem for future free blacks and

black slaves in the United States.

The concept of popular sovereignty was also affected by the Dred Scott decision

because people felt they had the right to either reject or accept slavery. The Supreme

Court decision in the Dred Scott case negated Popular Sovereignty. It was questioned that

if Congress could not exclude slaves from a territory, how could a territorial legislature

do so? Until statehood was granted, slavery seemed as unprofaned as freedom of religion

or speech or any other civil liberty guaranteed by the Constitution.

Finally the case determined the future of slavery in America because the Dred

Scott decision drew a clear line of how the government stood on the issue of slavery, and

further inflamed passions surrounding an already divisive topic within American politics.

While southerners were happy with the outcome, the massive abolitionist campaign to aid

Scott led many southerners to claim that abolitionists were anti-southern and thus,

enemies of a greater Union. Southern slave owners, as well as supporters of slavery, saw

the Dred Scott case as a crucial precedent. It gave them a sense of legal standing to be

able to say that the supreme law of the land had not only upheld the idea of slavery, but

also dealt a crushing blow to the wildly unpopular Missouri Compromise. That act had

sought to limit the spread of slavery into the new territories of the west and maintain the

racial balance of power between North and South.

That was the implications the Dred Scott decision had on the status of free blacks

in the United States, the concept of popular sovereignty, and the future of slavery in

America. The case was a landmark in the United States history and many argue that it

contributed to the spark that ignited the Civil War between the North and South. If it

weren’t for the Dred Scott case the history books would have not been the same.