Vermont watchman and State journal. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1836-1883, 1857-07-31
THE DRIED SCOTT DECISION.


The paper in the Law Reporter for juno,
IS said to be the joint production of Horace
Gray, Jr and John Lowell, Esqs., both of
the Boston Bar. The results Of their inves-
] tigauon are briefly stated as follows
fW@-As to the question, Can negro
! be citizen Of the United Statesr IL has
been commonly supposed that the Court deci-
ded this question in the'negative. This is a
mistake. From the form il was presented Il
was very doubtful whether it was before the
court for decision. -Four of the nine Judo-
es thought It was these were the Chief Jus
tco, and Justices Wayne and Daniel, who
answer the question in the negative, and Jus
ticc Curtis, who answers the question in the
affirmative. of the Judges who give no opin-
ION on the point one Judge McLean) declares
that if he answered the question at all it
would be in the affirmative; Judge Catron,
when Chief Justice Of the Supreme Court of
Tennessee, gave an opinion directly involving
an affirmative answer to the question the
three other Judges gave no clue to their opin-
ions. On this question, then, the Court
stands thus three in the affirmative, three in
the negative and three silent.
Secondy--Was the Missouri Compromise
Constitutional? II is perfectly well-settled
principle of the Supreme Court, and one that
has often been laid down from It's bench, that
no part of an opinion Of the Court is TO be
regarded as of authority as precedent which
was not necessary to the determination of the
question before it. Anything beyond this is
merely the expression of the individual opin-
ion of the judge; and it has been we'll said
that " if general dicta are TO be considered as
establishing the law, nothing is yet settled or
can long be settled Bearing this in mind,
let us look at the facts of the case. Scott was
a slave IN Missouri was taken by his master
to Illinois, and thence into a territory of the
United states where slavery was prohibited
by the Missouri Compromise and thence
back to Missouri. The opinion of the Court
is placed upon the ground that the law of
Missouri is TO decide whether Scott is or is
not a slave now that he has returned thither.
II this be so, what matters it whether the
compromise was valid or invalid. In other
words whether Scott was free when in Illi-
n1is, or in the territory. or whether he con-
tinued to be slave all the time. And if the
Court goes out of its way to give an opinion
on this point, could a palmer instance be
found of an opinion on point not necessary
to the determination Of the rights Of the par
ties
" The Court, then, has not decided that the
Missouri Compromise was unconstitutional.
i"'"ty-lhi ms case is often spoken of as
deciding that master may take his slave to a
free state and there hold bim as a slave This
is a simple mistake; there is no such point
decided. But
Fomthly-The doctrine is here established
that, if slave be taken by his master to a
free state, and does not there claim his liberty.
but consents to return with his master to a
slave state, he may be held as a slave there. if
the highest Court of that State considers him
still to be a slave. In other words the bred
Scott case does not decide that negro is
slave in free State because he iras a slave in
the State from which he was brought; nor,
that slave carried from slave to free state
and brought back, is free because he might
have claimed his freedom in the free state
but leaves his freedom or slavery to be set
tied by the laws of the slave state to which
he returned with his master"