Minority rights in the Taney years, 1836–64

Covers the years of the antebellum Taney Court (1836–60), comparing Supreme Court policy toward blacks and Native Americans with Presidential and Congressional policy toward them. On the Court, Justice Story exercised intellectual leadership until his departure at the end of 1845. Under Story’s leadership, the Court both freed more slaves from the Amistad ship than the executive branch desired and undermined the enforceability of the Congressional Fugitive Slave Act (1793) in Prigg v. Pennsylvania (1842).The Court from 1846 until 1860, under Taney’s leadership was utterly unsupportive of the rights of blacks and of Indians. The elected federal branches in these years were nearly as bad. Congress passed the Kansas Nebraska Act, abandoning the limits of the Missouri Compromise; President Buchanan wanted Congress to accept the illegitimate Lecompton Constitution. No branch of the federal government supported racial minority rights 1846–60. This extremism begat the election of Lincoln. KEY WORDS: U.S. v. Rogers (1846) Groves v. Slaughter (1841) Prigg v. Pennsylvania (1842) Fugitive Slave Act Ableman v. Booth (1854–61) Dred Scott Indian Removal