It did. But the decision in Scott v Emerson was just as unsound legally as the decision in Scott v Sandford.
I will point out one unsound point in Taney’s decision. As I pointed out in this post (a damn fine one if I do say so myself), Taney completely ignores Illinois laws. The contention is that when Scott went back to MIssouri then Scott’s legal status in Illinois is immaterial. That bothers me because if Scott were free in Illinois then Taney is saying kidnapping a free black man and taking them to a state that would recognize them as slaves was perfectly legal.
I agree. But Taney based his opinion on Missouri law. And the Missouri Supreme Court is the ultimate arbiter on Missouri law. It cannot be wrong insofar as Missouri law is concerned. As such, Taney’s reliance on Scott v. Emerson was sound, however, I argued upthread that Illinois law should have been considered because:
Excellent, and I agree. Scott should have been analyzed as an Illinois citizen under the case (once Taney overcame his ridiculous overall proposition). The Court could and should have ruled that it will not subject Scott to the jurisdiction of Missouri when he was, in effect, a free Illinois citizen who was kidnapped and returned to Missouri.
Winny v. Whitesides, 1 Mo. 472, 475 (Mo. 1824)
Rachael v. Walker, 4 Mo. 350, 354 (Mo. 1836)
Look it up. These were two of the main precedents set in Missouri courts that said that a slave taken to a free state was free and remained free when he returned to Missouri. According to Missouri law. These were decisions upheld by the Missouri Supreme Court. They were not obscure rulings; dozens of other black people in Missouri won their cases in Missouri courts based on these Missouri rulings.
Chief Justice Taney was not following Missouri Law. Chief Justice Scott (yes, the judge who decided Scott v Emerson was named William Scott) was also not following Missouri law.
Chief Justice Scott (with a majority of the MO Supreme Court) had the power to change the Missouri common law. I agree with what you are saying. MO law DID, prior to Scott v. Emerson, adopt the “once free always free” doctrine. Scott v. Emerson changed that.
When asking “What is MO law?” Taney should look at the latest pronouncement of Scott v. Emerson and not the two older cases you cited. It matters not if Scott v. Emerson was incorrectly decided. The institution charged with deciding MO law said that Scott v. Emerson was correct. That makes it correct as far as MO law is concerned.
Not a big fan of stare decisis?
Possibly not, but that does not matter. And there must be some disconnect because we keep going back and forth on this point.
Imagine you are Taney prior to putting quill pen to paper and writing the opinion, and you ask yourself, “What is Missouri law concerning a slave who is taken to a free state and then returned to Missouri?”
The answer must be: Scott v. Emerson which holds that Missouri does not recognize the freedom of a slave by travel to a free state.
And that is the end of the analysis if you are Taney. Taney may not then go behind that decision and say that the Missouri Supreme Court did a real shit job on that, and that Missouri law REALLY is X. Missouri law is what the Missouri Supreme Court says it is, even if it reached its law by overturning a long series of precedent, failed to respect stare decisis, was drunk on the day it was decided, or simply dropped the ball in its analysis. That analysis of state law is unreviewable by federal courts.
Now, if Missouri law is contrary to federal law or the federal constitution, then the U.S. Supreme Court can void Missouri law on those grounds, but it may not decide what Missouri law IS.
Your argument seems to be that there is no such thing as an unsound legal decision because a judge is allowed to make any decision he wishes.
No, he’s saying that a federal court can’t overturn a state court decision on an issue of state law just because it’s unsound.
This has not been proven.
He’s saying that federal judges can’t overrule a state court just because they believe a legal decision the state court came to is unsound. States have final jurisdiction over what state laws are unless there is a constitutional issue with their laws, and the court didn’t allege that there was.
One of the better arguments against Taney’s was that of Justice Benjamin Curtis. In his dissent, Curtis, ironically a supporter of the Fugitive Slave Act and later an opponent of the Fourteenth Amendment, argued that
- the path to federal citizenship began with state citizenship. ff you were a citizen of a state, you were, ipso facto, a U.S. citizen.
- 5 of the original states had Black citizens at the time of their admission; therefore, Blacks were not only citizens but had participated in the Constitution’s ratification–so the idea that the Constitution had been ratified by whites alone was false.
I dont see where he said that. 
This is the portion: