Roger Brooke Taney Carmel had begun to overcast political heavens.
the
At the December term, 1854, the case
of Dred Scott v. Sanford first appeared on the docket of the court, having come up on writ of error from the judgment of the Circuit Court of the United States for the District of Missouri, which had decided that being a slave, Dred Scott
was the lawful personal property of Sanford. Of the Chiefs associates when he took the oath of oflice only Wayne of Georgia, the last surviving associate of Marshall, and McLean of Ohio, remained.
After them in order
of seniority sat Nelson of New York, Grier of Pennsylvania, Catron of Ten nessee, Curtis of Massachusetts,
who
161
tension, and it kept up a constant agita tion aided by an ever increasing senti ment in its favor at the north. Many of its members looked upon the fugitive
slave clause of the Constitution “as a covenant with death and an agreement with hell,” while the rank and file of the party regarded laws enacted for its en forcement as a national disgrace, to be
removed from the statute-book at all hazards. It was Taney's misfortune that during the closing part of his judicial career the question of whether the na
tion could exist “half slave and half free" was never absent in some form from the public mind, and indirectly
presented itself in new phases for de cision in the federal courts. It had un hesitatingly been decided by Chief Jus tice Marshall in Williamson v. DanieLs,13
had been appointed by Fillmore to suc ceed Woodbury, Daniel of Virginia, and Campbell of Alabama. It was before
when construing a bequest, and by Mr.
these judges, each eminent as a jurist, that the most celebrated case in Ameri
Justice Story in Prigg v. Pennsylvania,“ and Chief Justice Taney in Strader v.
can judicial annals when the conse quences of the decision are weighed came on for argument.
property.
We of today little realize the inten
sity of feeling which the agitation over the extension of slavery had aroused.
Into that hour of fury and sectional strife the future historian, after a sufli
Graham,“ that
slaves were
personal
It was established law, what
ever might be rightfully said by moral ists and humanitarians of the iniquity of such a conception, or of a doctrine so unjust, and subversive of the higher law, that a slave was a chattel, passing with his oflspring by bargain and sale from owner to owner. The Missouri Compromise in 1820, when Missouri was admitted to the union as a free labor state, provided that slavery should not
cient time has passed, will enter with such fullness of information and clarity of judgment as to do full justice to all the participants, whether they joined issue in the forum, or on the field. be carried into the territory north of The contest was inevitable. And while 360 and 30', which was the parallel of Jackson and Webster had postponed the latitude bounding Missouri on the south. final arbitrament of arms, it was not The compromise of 1850 declared that within the power of legislatures or courts
Congress would not interfere with the
or of statesmen to stay the march of public opinion, which more and more would not be satisfied with half measures but demanded the abolition of slavery. The “free soil" party, although it had
question of slavery in the territories organized since the Missouri Compro
lost the Presidential election of 1856,
had been organized to oppose its ex
mise, but would leave the question to be determined by their inhabitants when
admitted as states. "12 Wheaton 568. l‘ 17 Peters 611. 1' 10 How. 82.
In 1852 the Demo
