Related Issues in the U.S. History Curriculum
Proper consideration of the issues raised by the Dred Scott case within the context of a U.S. History course must begin long before a class begins to study the events leading up to the Civil War. Although it isn’t the primary focus of this unit, it makes sense to review some of the related issues that should be covered that provide direct connections to Dred Scott. The first of these issues encountered will be the establishment of race-based slavery in the early colonial era. It is important for students to consider how the institution of indentured servitude was slowly transformed into slavery as laws began to define the status of individuals based on race.
An exploration of the ideals of the American Revolution will certainly be important for a satisfactory understanding of the Dred Scott case. As the fundamental proclamation of those ideals, the Declaration of Independence is an obviously important component of the U.S. History curriculum and will serve to inform the discussion on Dred Scott by addressing one important question: who did Jefferson and his collaborators mean when they referred to “all men”? Perhaps some discussion of the concept of an ideal as compared to reality would be useful at this point. The Enlightenment thinkers certainly promoted the idea of universal god-given human rights that are retained by all men regardless of status -- racial or otherwise. (the rights of women are less clear -- if we now have expanded the ideal to include women, could it earlier have been expanded to include blacks?). The founding fathers, however, felt forced by circumstances to accept slavery as a necessary evil -- and contradiction. Most did see it as an evil nevertheless and looked forward to some vague time in the future (preferably after their deaths) when it would be abolished. Students should be asked to consider, however, how this thinking related to the racial attitudes of the time.
Thomas Jefferson himself can serve as a model for students on the thinking of many Americans of the time on this issue. A revealing comparison can be made between Jefferson’s writings in which he condemns slavery and the parts of his
Notes on the State of Virginia
in which he writes of the inherent inferiority of blacks in his home state (see web address below for text). Was his belief in natural law and his optimistic faith in the power of reason able to overcome his essential racial bias? Jefferson is remarkably honest about the inherent contradictions in his thinking and he explores them in
Notes
. This double think is inherent in much of American culture right on through the antebellum period. Perhaps most white Americans at the time of Dred Scott would agree that slavery was an evil and yet could not bring themselves to consider blacks as their social equals. The only ones who had resolved this contradiction were the radical abolitionists who were calling for racial equality and southern slaveholders who argued that slavery was a positive good. Indeed, Taney’s opinion was a clear attempt to resolve this contradiction once and for all.
The next related subject that arises in the U.S. History curriculum is the Constitution. The most important point to consider at this point in relation to Dred Scott is the degree to which the framers sought to avoid the issue of slavery altogether. Indeed the dreaded “S” word is never even used. It is essential for students to understand that the Constitution is a document that is largely based on compromise rather than a clear unifying vision. This concept should be familiar to students as most textbooks emphasize the importance of the Great Compromise and the Three Fifths Compromise. Of the three clauses that relate to slavery, only the three-fifths clause expressly differentiates between free and unfree persons and none of them specifically authorize or limit slavery. Even the fugitive-slave clause seeks to avoid the contradiction between humanity and property by referring to a slave as a “person held to service or labor.” Such a designation seems to imply a temporary arrangement more in line with indentured servitude than slavery.7 A careful reading of each of these three clauses reveals a genuine desire on the part of the framers to keep the federal government out of the slavery business. Don E. Fehrenbacher in his seminal work on the Dred Scott case put it this way:
-
It is as though the farmers were half-consciously trying to frame two constitutions, one for their own time and the other for the ages, with slavery viewed bifocally -- that is, plainly visible at their feet, but disappearing when they lifted their eyes.8
-
Curriculum units on the early republic should and usually do include study of
Marbury v. Madison
and its effect on the developing role of the Supreme Court. In this case the court famously establishes the right of Judicial Review that gives it the power to strike down any action by federal or state governments that are deemed to be unconstitutional. Students should recognize that it is at this point that the Court begins to position itself as a potentially powerful arbiter on constitutional issues. There are several interesting points of comparison with Dred Scott, however, which may prove useful for students to consider later. Together the cases represent the only times before the Civil War that the Court actually struck down federal law. In both cases as well the issue of jurisdiction was side stepped so that the Chief Justices could rule on broader issues that would otherwise be moot. In the first case, however, Chief Justice John Marshal was acutely aware of the limitations of his power and the deep political divisions in the country and sought to establish principles without requiring action by the government that would be unenforceable. Taney, on the other hand, failed to make the same realization as he entered an even more divisive political minefield.
Territorial expansion and the philosophy of Manifest Destiny should play a central role in U.S. history curriculum and explores issues that are also important to the Scott case. As each new section was added to the nation, the question of the expansion of slavery was considered and debated with increasing bitterness until it became the central point of contention between the sections. Students should understand that the evolution of the debate paralleled the hardening of attitudes on race and increasing bitterness over the issue of slavery itself. The Northwest Ordnance of 1787, which banned slavery north of the Ohio River, was enacted by Congress under the Articles of Confederation and later adopted by Congress under the Constitution with little debate and strong support from southern states. When the issue was confronted again in 1819 in relation to the lands added by the Louisiana Purchase, however, sectional friction over slavery had risen considerably. The Missouri Compromise, which resolved the question for a time, was seen with great suspicion by many southerners and was actually opposed by a majority of northern members of Congress. Thomas Jefferson, who thirty years earlier had proposed a ban on slavery in all the territories, now felt that even the partial limitation included in the compromise was “the knell of the Union.”9 Whether Congress had the power to limit slavery in the territories and whether future states created from territories where slavery was “forever forbidden” could make a choice were questions that many raised at the time and later disputed in the Scott Case. It would make sense to get students to look again at article 4, section 3 of the Constitution to see how Congress’ role in ruling the territories and admitting new states is described.
The Missouri Compromise nevertheless was able to hold the union together until the addition of still more territory with the annexation of Texas and the subsequent Mexican War. Soon after the declaration of war, David Wilmot, a northern Democratic member of the House of Representatives introduced his famous Proviso that sought to ban slavery in all territories acquired from Mexico. Although the Proviso was eventually defeated in the Senate, it brought the question of the expansion of slavery back to the fore and this time the intensity of feelings on the issue were not to cool until the Civil War settled the issue. One illustration of the lack of common ground that students may consider is the dearth of political support for the Compromise of 1850. Fehrenbacher includes tables of voting patterns that show that only a small minority of members of Congress actually supported the compromise. Only 61 members of Congress -- about 21 per cent -- voted for at least four of the five compromise measures.10 In was in the midst of this highly charged political atmosphere that Dred Scott took the first step in Missouri court to sue for his freedom.m.
The Dred Scott Opinions
The makeup of the Court that heard the Scott case is a reflection of the degree to which the slaveholding class dominated the national government in the first half of the 19th Century. It is also a valuable illustration of how the Constitution was designed to protect vested interests, limit the power of voting majority, and how the power of those interests was (still is?) manifested in the Supreme Court. The Taney Court is a good case in point. Five of the justices were from slaveholding families in southern states: James Wayne of Georgia, John Catron of Tennessee, Peter V. Daniel of Virginia, John A. Campbell of Alabama, and Chief Justice Roger B. Taney of Maryland. The four remaining justices were from northern free states, but two -- Samuel Nelson of New York and Robert Grier of Pennsylvania -- were known to be strong supporters of slavery. Benjamin Curtis of Massachusetts, who was to surprise the nation with his strong dissent from the Scott decision, was a conservative with strong ties to the textile industry and had never shown any opposition to slavery. Only John McLean of Ohio, a Republican who had rejected his previous affiliation with the Democratic Party, was an open opponent of slavery.11 Thus the Court was heavily weighted to one side of an issue upon which public opinion had been increasingly leaning the other way for decades.
Students may wonder how, in a democratic society, a government institution like the Supreme Court with such broad powers could come to be so far removed from the political will of the people. To answer this question students should look back at the Constitution and note how members of the Supreme Court are selected: they are appointed by the President and confirmed by the Senate (Article 2, Section 2, Paragraph 2). Once in office they have life terms. Due to the politics of the Electoral College and the need of the two major parties to maintain a base in the South, all of the Presidents from Jackson to Buchanan were either openly supportive of slavery or neutral on the issue. The framers moreover had established the Senate as the upper house of Congress where representation was not based on population. Add to this the fact that Senators were chosen not by the voters, but by state legislatures and it becomes clear that the makeup of the court could be many steps removed from popular political pressure. Students should bear in mind that this least democratic branch of government also determined for itself in
Marbury
that it had broad power to strike down law and set legal precedent as the sole legitimate interpreter of the Constitution.
A unit on Dred Scott must include readings of excerpts of Taney’s opinion and Curtis’ dissent (the dissenting opinion with the greatest political impact), but before students begin to read they must be asked to consider why the Court’s opinions are written, published and distributed in the first place. A member of Congress or even the President may or may not explain a vote or an action, but only judges are required and expected to fully justify their decision in writing. The idea that an opinion of the Court must have a firm foundation in the Constitution and legal precedent is intricately connected to why decisions of the Court are accepted despite the fact that they are not subject to ordinary democratic processes. This is especially true in those cases that are of great interest to the broader public and therefore have wide-ranging political implications. If the opinions are convincing and based on widely accepted norms and values, they tend to be accepted especially if the Court is unanimous. If, on the other hand, a narrow majority on the Court seeks to render judgment on questions upon which public opinion is bitterly divided, public reaction and actions by the other branches of government may serve to render the decision moot, ignored, or overturned. In these types of cases the dissenting opinions can have a significant political impact because they point to an alternative that is similarly based on legal reasoning.
As is the case with primary source readings in general, reading the Scott opinions presents challenges for the high school curriculum particularly when students are at or below grade level in reading. Text rendering is a method in which students read a selection multiple times in a classroom setting and identify key words and phrases that express the main ideas of the reading (see lesson plan below). If care is taken to select excerpts that will resonate with students, the method will be effective in providing a distinctive voice to accompany the facts of the case. The excerpts I have chosen (see appendix) for the lesson plan below are relatively brief and speak directly to the three essential questions Taney decided in the case:
-
1. Could blacks sue in federal court? Are they citizens of the United States? Can they sue as merely state citizens?
-
2. Did Congress have the power to prohibit slavery in the territories? In other words, was the Missouri Compromise constitutional?
-
3. Was Missouri obligated to recognize Dred Scott’s freedom based on his residence in either Illinois or the Wisconsin Territory?12
Through the process of text rendering students should be able to articulate the reasoning Taney uses to defend his answers for each of these questions. Students should also be encouraged to consider Taney’s primary goal in rendering such a decision. Why did he render such a broad ruling that went to the heart of the issues that so bitterly divided the nation at the time? What other options did he have in this case? Could he have ruled that Scott was still a slave without getting into issues of slavery in the territories or the rights of African-Americans? Upon what basis did he believe that the Supreme Court had the right, the responsibility, and the power to take such an action? Could, and should, the court play such a role today? Would it be more able to do it today than it did in 1857?
As far as law is concerned, dissenting opinions have no bearing whatsoever. They set no precedent and have no influence on the ruling of the court in a particular case. In
Dred Scott
, however, the Court stepped into a political arena where opposing views in the debate over slavery did count for a great deal. Justice Benjamin Curtis’ dissent provided those who opposed the decision with a case for how the Court could have, and should have, ruled if it were acting in a “proper” unbiased way and not merely acting to support the slave holding interest. Why it was Curtis’ opinion and not Justice John McLean’s that was widely quoted and reprinted may have had to do with the fact that it was somewhat of a surprise. As a Democrat and a conservative, his views were untainted by partisanship and appeared to be based on disinterested principal. As such it became a powerful weapon in the hands of Republicans like Horace Greeley, the publisher of the New York
Tribune
, who published a pamphlet edition of Taney’s opinion and Curtis’ dissent as soon as he had the text. The dissent was also used by several northern legislatures as the basis for resolutions opposing Taney’s decision and it became an important political document in both the 1858 and 1860 elections.
The excerpts of the Curtis dissent that I have selected focus on the issue that brought it the most attention: the questions of citizenship for free blacks. Again text rendering will provide the most effective way of getting to the main ideas that are expressed. In discussing the reading, students should consider why dissenting opinions are published by the Court if they don’t represent the Court’s ruling and are not considered law. What purpose do they serve in the short term or over a longer period of time? What role can dissents play in the political arena? Do dissents add to the strength of the Court as a government institution or does it take away from its power? How is the political effect of a Court’s ruling different if it is unanimous and there is no dissent? The purpose of these questions and the discussion that they generate is not so much to come up with definitive answers, but to get students thinking about the role and power of the Court. It is the context of these types of discussions that it make sense to look at today’s Supreme Court and consider a recent decision that had an impact similar to
Dred Scott.
A short writing assignment upon completion of the readings of the two excerpts will push students to analyze and critique the reasoning used by the two justices on the subject of citizenship for African-Americans. Students should be asked to state in a short essay which reasoning they believe is more effective and explain why. In order to avoid the tendency of students to simply defend Curtis’ dissent because it is morally correct, the teacher can play devil’s advocate. Moral questions aside, is it all that unreasonable to argue that the Constitution, as it existed in 1857, really was by and for white people? Could a document that allowed the enslavement of people on the basis of race be used in any way to defend racial equality? These are question that students must respond to if they are to defend Curtis’ opinion as the more reasonable. On the other hand, those students who find Taney’s opinion more convincing need not feel that they are defending it as ethical, but simply one that expressed the truth as it stood at that time.
Another, more involved approach would be to set up a debate/role play in which students take on the task of presenting oral arguments before a mock Supreme Court (see lesson plan below). In order to involve as many students as possible it will be necessary to divide up the basic issues of the case and assign each one to teams of two on each side of the case. Thus, six students will divide the three basic questions of citizenship, constitutionality of the Missouri Compromise, and the right of the State of Missouri to determine Scott’s status and argue in favor of Scott, while six other students take on the same three questions and argue in favor of Sandford. Three to five students will take on the role of the Supreme Court and ask questions during the oral arguments and write opinion based on which group was most convincing. A larger court is not really necessary and will make it more difficult for the students to come to a decision on a ruling. The remaining students will represent the press and will write editorials expressing the range of public reaction to the case. A critical element of this approach will be the instructions which must be provided to each group in order to structure the lesson and insure that students will not be overwhelmed by their tasks. Those students participating in the role-play need to be provided with a script that will guide their approach and provide them with a structure that they can build on with their own reasoning.
Reaction to the Decision
A critical issue for the Supreme Court today as well as in 1857 that students should consider, is the degree to which public response to a controversial ruling can influence the impact of that ruling. Constitutionally the weakest of the three branches, the Court depends on the soundness of its reasoning and above all on its prestige to garner support for its rulings and insure that they are enforced. This was far more true before the Civil War when the Court lacked the near universal esteem it enjoys today. For the Dred Scott case there are two avenues to explore public reaction: newspaper editorials and the Lincoln-Douglas debates. Both of these sources reveal how deeply divided the nation was on the issues of the case and the degree to which these questions had in no way been resolved by the Court’s ruling.
Newspaper editorials provide a quicker and more direct way to expose students to the range of public reaction to the case. An excellent resource for editorials on Dred Scott is the Secession Era Editorials Project website (see address below) which includes a wide range of opinion pieces on both sides of the issue. Students should understand that in this era newspapers were rarely politically neutral as they tend to be today. They were often affiliated with a particular political party or even a faction within a party. As they fought with their rivals for circulation they often reflected as well as shaped the diverse opinions of their readers. Upon reading each article, students should be asked to consider first whether the writer supports or opposes the ruling in Dred Scott, second what the writer considers to be the implications of the decision, and finally what is being proposed as a response or desirable outcome.
An instructive example of reaction from the North against the decision is “The Issue is Forced Upon Us” (see resources below) which was printed in the Albany, New York
Evening Journal
on March 9, 1857. In this case the writer sees the decision as further evidence that the slaveholding class now has taken complete control of the national government. His reference to the Lemmon Case is important and will need to be explained to students before they read the piece. The Lemmons were slave owners from Virginia who sought to bring their slaves through New York City in order to catch a steam ship to New Orleans. When a New York court freed their slaves, the ruling was appealed, had worked its way through the New York courts, and was generally expected to come before the Taney Court. With the Dred Scott decision as a precedent, it seemed clear to many northerners that slavery was on the verge of being nationalized. The outcome proposed by the editor in this case points up an issue that is still current with respect to the Supreme Court -- that it is anti-democratic in that it has the power to thwart the will of the people. Without the support of the people, he avows, the “conspiracy of the Oligarchy is wholly incomplete.”13 There are numerous recent cases in which the will of the people is at issue, one of which,
Bush v. Gore,
will be considered at the end of the unit.
To get a perspective from the other side of the political spectrum, students should read “The Issue Must Be Met” from the Milledgeville, Georgia,
Federal Union.
The writer here believes, as did Taney, that the ruling in the case has put the slavery question finally to rest. Students should note the irony of the fact that southerners of this political stripe -- who would in three years agitate for secession -- saw themselves at that point as “union men” who hoped to join with “law-abiding men of the North” in supporting a Constitution that now clearly appeared to be protected their interests.14 Another interesting point to note is the use of the term “Black Republican Party.” Democrats from both sections frequently used this term in an effort to paint Republicans as supporters of racial equality -- which was an anathema to most Americans at the time -- rather than advocates of free soil, an issue that garnered much wider support. Indeed the issue of equal rights for free African-Americans was one that had the potential to split the Republican Party, leading many Republican leaders to oppose the ruling in Dred Scott far more on the basis of its voiding the Missouri Compromise rather than its assault on the Constitutional rights of blacks.cks.
A third example that illustrates the northern Democratic view is “The Question Settled -- Black Republicanism vs. the Constitution” which was printed in March of 1857 in the Concord, New Hampshire,
New Hampshire Patriot.
The editor here emphasizes the role of the Democratic Party as “the constitutional, national, Union party of the country.” From this perspective, the combination of the Scott ruling with the election of the Democrat Buchanan as President have saved the nation from the divisive dangers of sectionalism. In addition to the three essential questions outlined above, students should consider why northerners from free states such as New Hampshire would be so supportive of the Court’s opinion in
Scott.
For many a mixture of motives from opposition to racial equality to a very understandable fear of disunion and possible civil war led to support for developments which might strengthen the national government at the expense of African-American rights.
The political impact of
Dred Scott
can also be explored in a more thorough (and time consuming) manner by reading excerpts of the debates between Abraham Lincoln and Stephen Douglas as they competed in the election for the U.S. Senate in 1858. The
Scott
ruling was not an issue that either man could ignore. For Lincoln it represented an attack on the very premise of the Republican Party: that slavery must be limited to the states where it currently existed. In the debates and in previous speeches he described the decision as the product of a conspiracy that included northern Democratic leaders such as Douglas and President Buchanan, the southern members of the Supreme Court and the slave holders of the South with the goal of forcing slavery on the entire nation. For Douglas the ruling had to be somehow reconciled with his policy of popular sovereignty incorporated in his Kansas-Nebraska Bill that left the slavery question for a territory and a new state up to the people who lived there. The question, repeatedly pressed by Lincoln, was how a territory could now act to exclude slavery, if the federal government was bound by the
Scott
ruling to allow it. Douglas’ answer, which became known as the “Freeport Doctrine,” was a skillful attempt to finesse the question. Slavery could never exist, he declared, if the local populace refused to provide local regulations and police enforcement power; thus the basic tenet of popular sovereignty was maintained. Despite his best efforts to walk this fine line, however, Douglas was unable to satisfy the southern wing of his party. It was yet another example of his being insufficiently supportive of slavery and it certainly denied him any chance to get southern support for a run for President.
Lincoln’s most definitive and eloquent pronouncements on the implications of
Dred Scott
are contained in his “House Divided” speech with which he opened his campaign for the Senate and which preceded the actual debates by several weeks. The text of the speech can be found on the
Africans in America
website referred to above which is a companion to the PBS series of that name (see resources below). The entire speech is certainly too long to be used, but excerpts in which he outlines in general terms his view of the decision as part of a larger conspiracy -- he uses the term “machinery” -- can be used effectively to show how Lincoln used it for political gain. The entire texts of all the debates can be found on the National Park Service web site for the Lincoln Home National Historic Site (see resources below). .
Dred Scott
was a central topic in all the debates, but the most famous exchange -- the debate in Freeport -- is perhaps the most useful to illustrate Douglas’ attempts to characterize the decision in terms that will cost him the least political damage. Another revealing source of Douglas’ positions with regard to o
Dred Scott
is a speech he gave on July 9 in response to the “House Divided” speech just prior to the beginning of the formal debates. In one part of the speech he attacks Lincoln for advocating racial equality and makes it quite clear that he believes that blacks are inferior and not deserving of the rights of citizenship. It was on the question racial equality that Republicans were most likely to disagree and Douglas was doing what he could to drive a wedge into that division and appeal to the deep-seated racist attitudes that were held by most Americans at the time. That section is fairly short and certainly goes far in helping students to understand the intensity of racial feelings in that era.
After reviewing the range of responses to
Scott
it will be important for students to consider the options open to those who passionately disagreed with the ruling and those who wanted to support the ruling over such disagreement. Lincoln makes it clear that the Republican Party would continue to express outright opposition. What did that mean exactly? What options were there to fight the ruling or defend the ruling short of lawlessness and violence (“Bleeding Kansas” might be a good example to raise hear)? In 1857 the Court had the firm support on this case from the executive branch, but what if this were not the case? Certainly with the inauguration of Lincoln in 1861 it was not. If the Supreme Court makes law and the executive declines to enforce that law, what is the result? From the time of John Marshal to the
Dred Scott
era the Court strained to achieve a status where its rulings would simply be accepted. What about the Supreme Court today? Does it still render judgments on equally controversial issues? Has the stature of the Court in American political culture risen to the point that its rulings are accepted without much question? It is at this point that it makes sense to consider a contemporary action by the Supreme Court that bears some resemblance to
Scott
at least in terms of its controversial and overtly political nature.
A Recent Supreme Court Case
A look at today’s Supreme Court and a recent case can take place at either the beginning or the end of this unit. If done at the beginning, it serves as an introduction to the institution and establishes the idea that the questions over the proper role of the court in American government have not changed a great deal over the past century and a half. If done at the end of the unit, it allows students to explore questions about the Court today that should come up as they study
Dred Scott.
There are of course many examples of controversial cases from recent decades that provide interesting parallels with
Scott
, but for a number of reasons
Bush v. Gore
stands out as especially instructive. Most importantly, it was argued before the members of the current Court and will therefore allow students to learn something about them. The case also illustrates in dramatic fashion the potential for the Court to enter into divisive political territory upon which there is little public agreement. The best resource on the web for material on the Supreme Court, its membership, and cases throughout its history, is
Oyez: U.S Supreme Court Multimedia
at oyez.org (see resource list below).
This portion of the unit should begin with an introduction to the Court’s membership. The
Oyez
website has short biographies of each justice. Divide the class into nine small groups of two or three to read each biography and assign each group the task of writing up a short oral presentation on each one. Several key facts should be provided for each: date of appointment, President who appointed them, political affiliations, location on the political spectrum (liberal, moderate, conservative) and age. These basic facts can be jotted down on the board as they are reported for students to retain in their notes. The identification of each justice’s political position will generate discussion on what the political spectrum means for a Court justice. It should be noted that the designation of liberal as a justice who is more likely to invoke federal authority to protect individual rights could be applied in the
Scott
case to Justices Curtis and McLean. By the same token, Taney and those who concurred with his ruling were more likely to be protective of states rights as are judicial conservatives today.
The case of
Bush v. Gore
is not overly complex and need not be considered in great depth for the purposes of this unit. A useful summary of the case can be found at civicmind.com (see complete address below) including short excerpts from the opinion, concurrences and dissents. The decision by the court in a vote of 5-4 during the election in 2000 to stop the recount of votes in Florida and essentially give the election to George W. Bush was certainly controversial and resulted in an outcry of derision and strong statements of support that is reminiscent of the response to the
Scott
ruling. Students should be asked why a majority on the Court felt justified in taking action in a matter -- the choosing of electors for the Electoral College -- that, according to the Constitution, is a state responsibility. Referring to their biographies of the individual justices, students should consider why each justice voted the way he or she did on this case. What will emerge is a curious contradiction: the conservative justices were unconvinced by a defense of state’s rights while the liberals were unmoved by concerns over equal protection of the laws. If ideology did not serve their thinking on this case what did? What is apparent is that most of the Republican appointees supported Bush’s claims while all of the Democratic appointees (there are only two) supported Gore’s. Just as the southern justices in n
Dred Scott
wanted to settle the divisive issue of the spread of slavery in support of slave holding interests, the Republican members desired to put an end to a bitterly contested election in the way they saw fit. The simple fact was that in each case they had the votes. Unlike the Dred Scott Decision, however, the ruling rendered in
Bush v. Gore
was universally accepted. No groups took to the streets or sought redress from other branches of government or from state governments. President Bush’s mandate has not been questioned in any fundamental sense. Such is the power wielded by the Supreme Court today.
Conclusion
Students should come away from this unit with an understanding that the Supreme Court is a powerful and vital institution that can have a great influence on their lives. They should develop an interest and a curiosity that will lead them to pay greater attention to its makeup and its actions in the future. Both
Dred Scott
and
Bush v. Gore
represent highly unusual actions for the Court, but they illustrate its potential power and the very real danger of abuse of that power. Students should consider the question of what kind of role the Court should play and decide which justices today are most likely to promote a role they would consider just and proper. The likelihood that the membership of the Court will change should promote an interest in Presidential electoral politics.
A century and a half ago, the nation was on the verge of Civil War and the Court lacked the standing necessary to impose a resolution of the issue that was tearing the nation apart. It may very well be that the impending conflict was unavoidable; that the differences between the sections had become so deep and bitter that no structure of government could have provided a peaceful solution. For the past century, however, the Court has inserted itself into disputes that were equally bitter and it has been accepted for the most part as the final arbiter. With this unit students should begin to establish a framework for thinking about the Court that they can build on as they continue with the U.S. history curriculum and as they study current events.