1 mars 1857 - Dred Scott vs. Sanford

Description:

Dred Scott was a slave who had lived with his owner in a free state before returning to Missouri, a slave state. Scott had argued in the trial that the time he had spent in a free state entitled him to be emancipated from his owner. However, the court decided that no black, free or slave, could claim US citizenship, so therefore blacks were unable to petition the court for their freedom if they were a slave and living in a free slave state. Because of this court case abolitionists were outraged, which heightened tensions between the North and the South.