Dred Scott and the Dangers of a Political Court

Dred Scott exemplies neither originalism nor aspirationalism gone wrong as many modern critics now argue. Rather the Dred Scott Court erred chiefly because the majority gave in to the still-relevant temptation to subordinate honest legal reasoning to the pursuit of what the majority regarded as a noble and crucial political agenda_in this case to protect slavery and the political power of the slave-holding South and thereby preserve the Union.