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Black History Month trivia quiz answer from Feb. 12

Posted 2/12/2008

What did the Dred Scott case decide?
Slavery was illegal in states admitted to the union after 1820.
Slaves were not citizens and Congress did not have the right to ban slavery on the state level.
A slave who escaped to a free state could no longer be returned to slavery.

Dred Scott v. Sandford involved Dred Scott, a slave, who was taken from a slave state to a free territory. Scott filed a lawsuit claiming that because he had lived on free soil he was entitled to his freedom. Chief Justice Roger B. Taney disagreed, ruling that blacks were not citizens and therefore could not sue in federal court. Taney further inflamed antislavery forces by declaring that Congress had no right to ban slavery from U.S. territories.

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