Library of Congress. Library of Congress. Center for the Book, sponsoring body moving image videorecording government publication two-dimensional moving image dcu 2007 monographic Washington, D.C. : Library of Congress, publisher 2007-03-06. eng

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1 online resource On March 6, 1857, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that African-Americans were not U.S. citizens, a decision that intensified ongoing debates about slavery, further polarizing the North and the South and helping give rise to the Civil War. Award-winning writer Mary E. Neighbour discussed "Speak Right On," her novel about Dred Scott, the former slave at the heart of the 1857 decision, in a program sponsored by the Center for the Book. In 1850, Scott was declared a free man by a St. Louis jury. However the Supreme Court in Missouri, a slave state at the time, reversed the decision two years later. Defended by Montgomery Blair, former mayor of St. Louis, Scott appealed the reversal to the U.S. Supreme Court. On March 6, 1857, the court ruled against Scott, seven to two. The majority opinion, written by Chief Justice Roger B. Taney, included the stipulation that blacks could not be citizens of the United States and thus could not claim any of the rights and privileges of citizenship. He also declared that the congressional ban on slavery in the western territories, a major provision of the 1820 Missouri Compromise, was unconstitutional because it violated the rights of slaveholders to their property. Scott did not live long enough to witness the war that would ultimately resolve the nation's position on slavery, but he did die a free man. In May 1857, the children of Peter Blow, Scott's owner in Missouri, purchased him and his family and freed them. On Sept. 17, 1858, Scott died of tuberculosis. Established in 1977 as a public-private partnership, the Center for the Book uses the resources of the Library of Congress to stimulate public interest in books, reading, literacy and libraries. For information about its events, projects, publications, state center affiliates and national reading promotion partners, visit www.loc.gov/cfbook. Researchers. Teachers. Classification: General Works. Classification: History: America. Classification: Law. Classification: Political Science. Mary E. Neighbour. Recorded on 2007-03-06. African American History. Government, Law. Biography, History. Government, World Affairs. https://hdl.loc.gov/loc.gdc/gdcwebcasts.070306ctb1800 2021687826 DLC 220805 20250607112720.9 22458267 Converted from MARCXML to MODS version 3.8 using MARC21slim2MODS3-8_XSLT1-0.xsl (Revision 1.172 20230208) eng