# Prior to the 13th Amendment Could A Northern State Re-establish Slavery **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [March 14, 2014, 12:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/prior-to-the-13th-amendment-could-a-northern-state-re-establish-slavery/683687 "2014-03-14T12:44:52Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![MEBuckner](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mebuckner/32/2896_2.png) [@MEBuckner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MEBuckner)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2014, 3:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/prior-to-the-13th-amendment-could-a-northern-state-re-establish-slavery/683687/21 "2014-03-15T03:20:48Z")
> [@lance\_strongarm](#): > > The idea that property can be a citizen or have rights was not grounded in the Constitution. A state can pretend that a thing, a piece of property, a two-legged farm animal, is a citizen if it wants, but the U.S. Constitution only mentions that property as property and never as citizen. Blacks, even free ones, are still blacks, and part of the slave class–things–rather than humans with rights. > > That was Taney’s basic argument, and it was both pretty good legally at the time and morally horrible - simply because it was a reflection of the moral failings of the Constitution. Taney just told people the truth about their own deeply flawed Constitution. He may not have intended it, but he did good for slaves, and all blacks, by affirming how terrible their plight was. Even antebellum law–even antebellum law in the slave states–didn’t actually pretend that slaves were simply “things” or “two-legged farm animals”. The Constitution specifically refers to slaves as _persons_–“three fifths of all other _Persons_”; “No _Person_ held to Service or Labour in one State”–and furthermore, the laws _in the slave states_ recognized that [slaves were still persons, and even still had _some_ rights](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=17153876&#post17153876). There was simply no Constitutional basis for Taney to decide that states could not free slaves, and having freed them, could not make them citizens. ---
**Author:** ![Tom\_Tildrum](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e95f7d/32.png) [@Tom\_Tildrum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tom_Tildrum)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2014, 4:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/prior-to-the-13th-amendment-could-a-northern-state-re-establish-slavery/683687/22 "2014-03-15T04:48:06Z")
> [@MEBuckner](#): > > Well, many states had abolished slavery before the Civil War; [Massachusetts abolished slavery before the adoption of the U.S. Constitution](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quock_Walker). But according to Roger Taney, even if a state chose to not only abolish slavery but to guarantee its freed slaves the full and equal rights of citizenship of that state, or chose to extend citizenship to lawfully manumitted slaves from slave states who moved to that free state, the Constitution somehow–without anything which actually _said_ so–ruled that such a person, a “citizen of Massachusetts”, could nonetheless never be “a citizen of the United States”. > … > > This claim doesn’t appear to have any grounding in the Constitution–even the antebellum Constitution–and was basically made by Chief Justice Taney _ex culo_. Current constitutional law reaches the same result as to a state that chooses to extend such rights to a fetus. _Dred Scott_ offends us because it runs counter to our moral sense, not because it lacks textual foundation. ---
**Author:** ![MEBuckner](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mebuckner/32/2896_2.png) [@MEBuckner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MEBuckner)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2014, 10:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/prior-to-the-13th-amendment-could-a-northern-state-re-establish-slavery/683687/23 "2014-03-15T10:02:07Z")
I think that’s a _tu quoque_. If you want to argue that _Roe v. Wade_ lacks textual foundation–in the appropriate thread and forum—knock yourself out. But that doesn’t say anything one way or the other about _Dred Scott_. ---
**Author:** ![Tom\_Tildrum](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e95f7d/32.png) [@Tom\_Tildrum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tom_Tildrum)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2014, 2:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/prior-to-the-13th-amendment-could-a-northern-state-re-establish-slavery/683687/24 "2014-03-15T14:42:39Z")
There are any number of ways to criticize _Dred Scott_. I’m just saying that textualism is an unconvincing choice, especially in the modern era. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2014, 4:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/prior-to-the-13th-amendment-could-a-northern-state-re-establish-slavery/683687/25 "2014-03-15T16:57:36Z")
> [@lance\_strongarm](#): > > How would you have ruled? With McLean, probably. In fact, before the decision, contra Taney’s argument, the US government recognized that blacks, or at least, free blacks, could be citizens of the US. See, for instance, this: > **[families | Library of Congress](https://www.loc.gov/families/)** > > We invite you and your family to participate in these activities, inspired by the collections, programs, and expertise of the Library of Congress. It’s a seaman’s protection certificate, which the federal government issued to sailors to protect them from impressment, and this one, for instance, states that Samuel Fox, who has a “light African complexion” is a “Citizen of the United States of America”. ---
**Author:** ![lance\_strongarm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/87869e/32.png) [@lance\_strongarm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lance_strongarm)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2014, 8:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/prior-to-the-13th-amendment-could-a-northern-state-re-establish-slavery/683687/26 "2014-03-15T20:54:05Z")
> [@MEBuckner](#): > > Even antebellum law–even antebellum law in the slave states–didn’t actually pretend that slaves were simply “things” or “two-legged farm animals”. The Constitution specifically refers to slaves as _persons_–“three fifths of all other _Persons_”; “No _Person_ held to Service or Labour in one State”–and furthermore, the laws _in the slave states_ recognized that [slaves were still persons, and even still had _some_ rights](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=17153876&#post17153876). There was simply no Constitutional basis for Taney to decide that states could not free slaves, and having freed them, could not make them citizens. That’s part of my point though - the Constitution allowed persons to be treated like animals while pretending it was still treating them like persons, by calling them “persons.” Taney, though perhaps not his intent, simply took the wool off the nation’s eyes. He said the Constitution treats certain people like farm animals, and we should stop pretending it doesn’t. It bared the truth of slavery. To issue a decision that said blacks had certain rights and were sort of human beings who could sort of be citizens sometimes would have not only further obscured the truth of the evils of slavery and racism, it would probably have further delayed finally confronting that truth. I can’t say Taney wanted that outcome, of course, but he unwittingly brought about a faster end to slavery by actually being honest about it. ---
**Author:** ![lance\_strongarm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/87869e/32.png) [@lance\_strongarm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lance_strongarm)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2014, 8:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/prior-to-the-13th-amendment-could-a-northern-state-re-establish-slavery/683687/27 "2014-03-15T20:58:55Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > No, it was not good legal reasoning. Taney pulled it out his ass. > > The Constitution said that slavery existed. But there is nothing in the Constitution, explicit or implied, that equated being black with being a slave. The Constitution divided people into free and slave not black and white. He didn’t say that black = slave. He said black = not citizen by virtue of black = not quite human. Slaves were property. The nation had rationalized keeping humans as property - while at the same time declaring “all men are created equal” - was to deny the humanity of certain of them, and they did that through racism. Blacks were simply not quite men and therefore not created equal. They were sometimes 3/5ths of a man, in fact. Taney just told the truth about the evil the Constitution had used to reconcile a nation claiming to stand up for liberty while holding slaves. ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2014, 4:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/prior-to-the-13th-amendment-could-a-northern-state-re-establish-slavery/683687/28 "2014-03-16T04:18:56Z")
> [@lance\_strongarm](#): > > He didn’t say that black = slave. He said black = not citizen by virtue of black = not quite human. Slaves were property. The nation had rationalized keeping humans as property - while at the same time declaring “all men are created equal” - was to deny the humanity of certain of them, and they did that through racism. Blacks were simply not quite men and therefore not created equal. They were sometimes 3/5ths of a man, in fact. Taney just told the truth about the evil the Constitution had used to reconcile a nation claiming to stand up for liberty while holding slaves. Your argument that slaves couldn’t be considered citizens because they were property shouldn’t apply to FREE blacks, either. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2014, 6:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/prior-to-the-13th-amendment-could-a-northern-state-re-establish-slavery/683687/29 "2014-03-16T06:06:52Z")
> [@lance\_strongarm](#): > > He didn’t say that black = slave. He said black = not citizen by virtue of black = not quite human. Slaves were property. The nation had rationalized keeping humans as property - while at the same time declaring “all men are created equal” - was to deny the humanity of certain of them, and they did that through racism. Blacks were simply not quite men and therefore not created equal. They were sometimes 3/5ths of a man, in fact. Taney just told the truth about the evil the Constitution had used to reconcile a nation claiming to stand up for liberty while holding slaves. Taney did say blacks equal slaves. Your own post just described how he did it. The Constitution does not say black people had no legal rights. It said that slaves had no legal rights (it didn’t actually say that either but we’ll let that pass). Taney wasn’t telling the truth about the Constitution - he was telling a lie about the Constitution. The mistake that Roger Taney and you are making is saying that black people don’t have legal rights because slaves don’t have legal rights. And the only way that works is if you accept the idea that blacks equal slaves. Look at it this way. If Taney had said that women had no legal rights because slaves had no legal rights, you’d see he was wrong (at least I’m hoping you would). Women had a distinct different legal status than slaves even though some women were slaves. And it was the same thing with black people - they had a distinct different legal status than slaves even though some blacks were slaves. Claiming that the legal status attached to slaves applied to all blacks was just as wrong as saying it applied to all women. It had no basis in American law. ---
**Author:** ![md2000](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/73ab20/32.png) [@md2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/md2000)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2014, 12:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/prior-to-the-13th-amendment-could-a-northern-state-re-establish-slavery/683687/30 "2014-03-16T12:35:35Z")
If I follow the arguments properly… (IF!) Taney said that (pretty accurate generalization) blacks were imported as property. Having once been property, they and their descendants were and would always remain property, for the simple reason that there is no magical formula in the constitution that converts property into persons, no matter how many generations removed. Acquiring citizenship in a state was not sufficiently magical to make it stick federally. I assume the number of free blacks that immigrated to the USA was inconsequential, although if one considers people moving from the Caribbean islands, it’s probably greater than zero. Plus, it ignores the status of blacks freed prior to the formation of the USA. (Any citizen of a state at ratification was a US citizen?) Plus, in contradiction - there’s nothing that says property cannot become persons, other than tradition. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2014, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/prior-to-the-13th-amendment-could-a-northern-state-re-establish-slavery/683687/31 "2014-03-16T16:37:19Z")
Taney didn’t say all blacks were slaves because obviously this wasn’t true. What he said was that blacks had the same legal rights as slaves. It’s not really clear whether Taney felt that blacks couldn’t be citizens because they were the descendants of slaves or if he thought they couldn’t be citizens simply because they were black. He wrote more of the former principle but seemed to reach conclusions that could only be justified by the latter principle. It’s clear that Taney was ruling from instinct rather than carefully reasoned principles. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/prior-to-the-13th-amendment-could-a-northern-state-re-establish-slavery/683687.md?page=1)