" Then opened the roar of loose
declamation in favor of "squatter sovereignty," and "sacred right of
self-government." "But," said opposition members, "let us amend the bill
so as to expressly declare that the people of the Territory may exclude
slavery." "Not we," said the friends of the measure; and down they voted
the amendment.
While the Nebraska bill was passing through Congress, a law-case,
involving the question of a negro's freedom, by reason of his owner
having voluntarily taken him first into a free State, and then into a
Territory covered by the Congressional prohibition, and held him as a
slave for a long time in each, was passing through the United States
Circuit Court for the District of Missouri; and both Nebraska bill and
lawsuit were brought to a decision in the same month of May, 1854. The
negro's name was Dred Scott, which name now designates the decision
finally made in the case. Before the then next Presidential election,
the law-case came to, and was argued in, the Supreme Court of the United
States; but the decision of it was deferred until after the election.
Still, before the election, Senator Trumbull, on the floor of the
Senate, requested the leading advocate of the Nebraska bill to state his
opinion whether the people of a Territory can constitutionally exclude
slavery from their limits; and the latter answers: "That is a question
for the Supreme Court.
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