were, at that time, considered as a subordinate and inferior class of beings, who had been subjugated, and whether emancipated or not, yet remained subject to their authority, and had no rights or privi leges but such as those who held the power and the government might choose to grant them." He then went on to say, not only that no persons, who had been or whose ancestors had been slaves, were regarded as citizens previously to or at the time of adopting the Federal Constitution, but that no State has or can have any right to confer citizenship on such persons.

ROGER B. TANEY.

This was a sufficiently strong denial of rights to the colored people, but the following paragraph touched Northern sentiment much more strongly: "It is difficult, at this day, to realize the state of public opinion in relation to that unfortunate race, which prevailed in the civilized and enlightened portions of the world at the time of the Declaration of Independence, and when the Constitution of the United States was framed and adopted, but the public

history of every European nation displays it in a manner too plain to be mistaken. They had, for more than a century before, been regarded as beings of an inferior order, and altogether unfit to associate with the white race, and so far inferior that they had no rights which a white man was bound to respect, and that the negroes might justly and lawfully be reduced to slavery for his benefit."

In still another paragraph he made an argument against any application, to the negro slave, of the language of the preamble to the Declaration of Independence, wherein life, liberty and the pursuit of

happiness are pronounced the inalienable rights of all men. In the course of this argument he said: "The unhappy black race were separated from the white by indelible marks and laws, long before established, and were never thought of, except as property, and when the claims of the owner or the profit of the trader were supposed to need protection. This state of public opinion had undergone no change when the Constitution was adopted, as is equally evident from its provisions and language."

Justice Taney further argued, at considerable length, that Dred Scott, being a negro, and descended from slaves, had no standing in the Court, and that the Court had no authority in the premises, yet he immediately proceeded to take jurisdiction. He quoted that clause of the Constitution which says: "Congress shall have power to dispose of and make all rules and regulations respecting the territory or other property of the United States." He asserted that this applied only to such territory as belonged to the United States at the time the Constitution was framed, and that the territory covered by the Missouri Restriction, having all been acquired since that time, was not subject to this provision.

He further affirmed that by the mere fact of our acquiring territory, the Government and the citizen both enter it under authority of the Constitution; that is to say that the Constitution takes effect upon any territory the Government may acquire, in such way that any slave-holder may at once take his slaves thither and hold them as property. He denied the power of Congress to negative this right, and nullified the Missouri Restriction in the following announcement: "Upon these conditions, it is the opinion of the Court that the Act of Congress which prohibited a citizen from holding property of this kind in the Territory of the United States, North of the line therein mentioned, is not warranted by the Constitution, and it is therefore void; and that neither Dred Scott himself, nor any of his family, were made free by being carried into territory, even, if they had been carried there by the owner, with the intention of becoming a perma nent resident."

Dred Scott's freedom had been further claimed on the ground that he had been taken, by his master, into the Free State of Illinois, and there kept for two or three years; but the Chief Justice disposed of this by saying that it was a matter to be adjudged by the Court of Missouri alone. It was not properly before the Supreme Court. Having thus played rather fast and loose with the whole question of

jurisdiction, he concluded his decision as follows: "Upon the whole, therefore, it is the judgment of this Court, that it appears by the record before us, that the plaintiff in error is not a citizen of Missouri, in the sense in which that word is used in the Constitution, and that the Circuit Court of the United States, for that reason, had no jurisdiction in the case, and could give no judgment in it. Its judgment for the defendant must, consequently, be reversed, and a mandate issued, directing the suit to be dismissed for want of jurisdiction.”

The judgment of the Chief Justice was concurred in, in most of its conclusions, by six of the Associate Judges, the only ones dissenting being Justices McLean, of Ohio, and Curtiss, of Massachusetts. Three of the Associate Justices, Wayne, of Georgia; Daniel, of Virginia, and Campbell, of Alabama, concurred with the Chief Justice in all his conclusions. Justice Catron, of Tennessee, took the curious ground that Congress had the power to govern the territories, but at the same time that slave-holders had the right, without reference to Acts of Congress, to take their slaves into the territories. The conclusions of Justice Nelson, of New York, and Grier, of Pennsylvania, involved the absurdity that Congress might legislate slavery into the territories, but could not prohibit it.

Justice Daniel, of Virginia, took this extreme ground: "Now the following are truths which a knowledge of the history of the world, and particularly that of our own country, compels us to know, that the African negro race have never been acknowledged as belonging to the family of nations; that, as amongst them, there never has been known or recognized by the inhabitants of other countries anything partaking of the character of nationality, or civil or political polity; that this race has been, by all the nations of Europe, regarded as subjects of capture or purchase, as subjects of commerce or traffic; and that the introduction of that race into every section of this country was not as members of civil or political society, but as slaves, as property, in the strictest sense of the term."

The logical result of the various opinions, filed by the majority of the Justices, was that any slave-owner might take his property into a Free State and hold it there, and it fairly justified the boast of Robert Toombs that he would yet call the roll of his slaves under the shadow of Bunker Hill Monument.

The Northern indignation at these utterances of the Supreme Court Justices was not at all mitigated by a consideration of the composition of the Court itself. A majority of the members were

from the South, and they, as well as their associates from the North, had generally been appointed for political reasons, and not on account of any special qualifications for a judicial position.

But if the Northerners were aroused to indignation at this judicial subversion of the Constitution, the South was put into a condition of alarm and wrath, by the John Brown attack upon the arsenal at Harper's Ferry, Virginia, in 1859. This remarkable man, who with seventeen white and five negro associates, startled and astounded the whole country, had already had a very stirring career in Kansas. Of his character, his follower and biographer, Jas. Redpath, said: "It has been asserted that he was a member of the Republican party. It is false. He despised the Republican party. It is true that, like every Abolitionist, he was opposed to the extension of slavery; and like the majority of Anti-Slavery men, in favor, also, of organized political action against it. But he was too earnest a man, and too devout a Christian, to rest satisfied with the only action against slavery consistent with one's duty as a citizen according to the usual Republican interpretation of the Federal Constitution. It teaches that we must content ourselves with resisting the extension of slavery. Where the Republicans said 'Halt,' John Brown shouted 'Forward, to the rescue!" He was an Abolitionist of the Bunker Hill school. He followed neither Garrison nor Seward, Gerrit Smith nor Wendell Phillips; but the Golden Rule and the Declaration of Independence, in the spirit of the Hebrew warriors, and in the God-applauded mode that they adopted." Redpath visited one of John Brown's camps in Kansas, and gives this account of what he learned there: "In this camp, no manner of profane language was permitted; no man of immoral character was allowed to stay, except as a prisoner of war. He made prayers, in which all the company united, every morning and evening, and no food was ever tasted by his men until the Divine blessing had been asked on it. After every meal, thanks were returned to the Bountiful Giver.

"Often, I was told, the old man would retire to the densest solitudes and wrestle with his God in secret prayer. One of his company subsequently informed me that, after these retirings, he would say that the Lord had directed him, in visions, what to do; that, for himself, he did not love warfare, but peace, only acting in obedience to the will of the Lord, and fighting God's battles for his children's sake. It was at this time that the old man said to me: 'I would rather have the small-pox, yellow-fever and cholera all together in my camp,

than a man without principles. It's a mistake, sir,' he continued, that our people make, when they think that bullies are the best fighters, or that they are the men fit to oppose these Southerners. Give me men of good principles, God-fearing men, and men who respect themselves, and, with a dozen of them, I will oppose any hundred such men as the Buford ruffians.' I remained in the camp about an hour. Never before had I met such a band of men. They were not earnest, but earnestness incarnate. Six of them were John Brown's sons."

Brown's entrance into Kansas affairs came about in this way. His four oldest sons migrated from Ohio to that Territory and settled in Lykens County, in the Southern part of the State, and not far from the Missouri border. They were here so harrassed, insulted and plundered that they found they could not live without arms, and wrote to their father to that effect. He procured a supply and went with them. He at once organized small bands of men to resist the aggressions of the Missourians. His first exploit was in a skirmish at Black Jack, of which the records are scant. His second was the battle of Osawatomie, which gave him the name Osawatomie Brown, Here, with thirty men skillfully posted under cover, he met a force of 500 Missourians, killed 32 and wounded 50 more, and held them at bay until his ammunition was exhausted, when he made a safe retreat, having lost only five men. There were enough other exploits of this kind to make his name a terror to the Missourians and to partly account for the consternation which his later and larger venture caused.

When Brown finally left Kansas he picked up twelve slaves in going through Missouri, brought them to Detroit, whence they were passed over to Canada. He then went East to prepare for his scheme of freeing the slaves in the South, to which he thought visions from the Lord had directed him. The first movement in this scheme, the occupation of Harper's Ferry, was arranged with great ability and with equally great boldness. Brown's force consisted of seventeen white men and five negroes. This handful of men, on the night of the 15th of October, quietly entered Harper's Ferry, and took possession of the armory buildings, which were guarded by only three watchmen, who were seized and placed in the guard-house. Then the watchmen at the Potomac bridge were captured and secured. At a quarter past one the Western train, on the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad arrived, and found the bridge guarded by armed men.