Significance of the Dred Scott Case

The Dred Scott case had major historical significance because it used the argument of property to defend that slavery could happen in the North and West – and that individual state laws governing slavery were not allowed – whilst also declaring the Missouri Compromise and other legal acts unconstitutional and determining that African Americans could not sue in court, and that they were not citizens. Taney, the judge of the case, rested his argument that Scott should not be released from slavery on the principle that slaves were property – since the Constitution states that each person has a right to property, Taney argued that it was unconstitutional to restrict this basic right in any way. “In effect, this meant that Congress had no power to prevent the spread of slavery” (History.com). Thereby, the decision essentially declared all state-defined laws regarding slavery invalid: in Taney’s opinion, according to the Constitution, slavery was legal in all territories and states, including those in the North and West which individually had put ends to slavery. Since he considered the Constitution as his only decision-making foundation, he completely ignored individual state laws regarding the highly debated issue, thereby making the ruling very significant in terms of its broader Constitutional interpretation and the fact that it essentially decided that slavery was legal in the whole of the United States (including locations which had prohibited it).

Another important area which contributed to the historical significance of the Dred Scott case was the fact that it used the power of judicial review to declare a federal law unconstitutional. Although the judicial branch of the US federal government had held the power of judicial review since the Marbury v. Madison case, the use of this power had been very infrequent and different in purpose than the purpose for which it was used in the Dred Scott case. In the Marbury v. Madison case, a federal law was declared unconstitutional – but the reason as to why was since the matter was outside of the scope of power of the federal government, and the decision that this federal law was unconstitutional meant that no decision could be reached for the Marbury v. Madison case. Contrary to this, Taney declared that slavery – which was both in laws not only at the state but also at the federal level – was not at all in the scope of the government to restrict since slaves were property, and every person had a right to property according to the Constitution. In doing so, Taney decided “that Congress had in fact exceeded its authority in the Missouri Compromise because it had no power to forbid or abolish slavery in the territories” (Urofsky) and that policies such as popular sovereignty were essentially all against the constitution, since they called for the regulation of private property – which was, as considered by the Constitution, a right. In this sense, the Dred Scott thereby had significance because of the fact that it turned around decades of hard work for federal compromises and agreements as “unconstitutional” and brought in a new type of interpretation of the Constitution and government in general which had not formerly been used in other situations of judicial review.

A final key outcome of the Dred Scott case which also contributed to the historical significance of the ruling was the decision that Scott was technically not able to sue to his nature as being black. Since “Scott was black, he was not a citizen and therefore had no right to sue,” (PBS), according to Taney, no black people throughout the entire nation could sue – which was a highly controversial decision which caused much upheaval, especially throughout the North. The fact that people of different races were receiving different rights in a court regardless of their status in society fuelled not only resentments in the North, but also powered a further increase in the separation between the two races in the Southern culture. Therefore, the Dred Scott case had a truly remarkable magnitude of impact on history as a whole. It demonstrated not only a novel way of constitutional interpretation and judicial review, but also declared many previous acts unconstitutional, allowed for slavery to continue (even in regions which had prohibited it) and clearly stated that black citizens did not have the right to partake in court scenes as the one who was suing someone else due to their lack of status as a citizen because of their skin colour. Each of these outcomes was not only essential in shaping American culture at the time, but also had long-term effects on future decisions and legislation due to the new rules enacted by Taney in regards to constitutional interpretation and its relation to pre-existing laws.

Works Cited

History.com. History.com. 26 August 2020. 25 November 2021.

PBS. PBS. n.d. 25 November 2021.

Urofsky, Melvin I. Britannica. 13 April 2021. 25 November 2021.