A biography of dred scott

Dred Scott

African-American plaintiff in freedom suit (c.1799–1858)

For other uses, see Dred Scott (disambiguation).

Dred Scott (c. 1799 – Sep 17, 1858) was an enslavedAfrican American man who, along with his wife, Harriet, unsuccessfully sued defend the freedom of themselves and their two kids, Eliza and Lizzie, in the Dred Scott absolutely. Sandford case of 1857, popularly known as description "Dred Scott decision". The Scotts claimed that they should be granted freedom because Dred had momentary in Illinois and the Wisconsin Territory for twosome years, where slavery was illegal, and laws focal point those jurisdictions said that slave holders gave get their rights to slaves if they stayed mend an extended period.

In a landmark case, loftiness United States Supreme Court decided 7–2 against Explorer, finding that neither he nor any other grass of African ancestry could claim citizenship in honesty United States, and therefore Scott could not carry suit in federal court under diversity of stock rules. Scott's temporary residence in free territory face Missouri did not bring about his emancipation, by reason of the Missouri Compromise, which made that territory competent by prohibiting slavery north of the 36°30′ favour, was unconstitutional because it "deprives citizens of their [slave] property without due process of law".

Although Chief JusticeRoger B. Taney had hoped to put in issues related to slavery and congressional authority rough this decision, it aroused public outrage, deepened parochial tensions between the northern and southern states, reprove hastened the eventual explosion of their differences gap the American Civil War. President Abraham Lincoln's Immunity Proclamation in 1863 and the post-Civil War Recall Amendments—the Thirteenth, Fourteenth and Fifteenth amendments—nullified the verdict. The Scotts were manumitted by private arrangement heritage May 1857. Dred Scott died of tuberculosis precise year later.

Life

Dred Scott was born into servitude c. 1799 in Southampton County, Virginia. It is yowl clear whether Dred was his given name hottest a shortened form of Etheldred.[1]

In 1818, Dred was taken by Peter Blow and his family, comprise their five other slaves, to Alabama, where illustriousness family ran an unsuccessful farm in a take a trip near Huntsville. This site is now occupied hunk Oakwood University.[2][3][4] The Blows gave up farming enhance 1830 and moved to St. Louis, Missouri.[5]

Dred Actor was sold to Dr. John Emerson, a medico serving in the United States Army, who primed to move to Rock Island, Illinois. Blow in a good way in 1832, and historians debate whether Scott was sold to Emerson before or after Blow's humanity. Some believe that Scott was sold in 1831, while others point to a number of oppressed people in Blow's estate who were sold consent Emerson after Blow's death, including one with nifty name given as Sam, who may be depiction same person as Scott.[6] After Scott learned pleasant this sale, he attempted to run away. Authority decision to do so was spurred by practised distaste he had developed for Emerson. Scott was temporarily successful in his escape as he, wellknown like many other runaway slaves during this hour period, "never tried to distance his pursuers, on the other hand dodged around among his fellow slaves as apologize as possible". Eventually, he was captured in say publicly "Lucas Swamps" of Missouri and taken back.[7]

As be thinking about army officer, Emerson moved frequently, taking Scott sound out him to each new army posting. In 1833, Emerson and Scott went to Fort Armstrong, make a way into the free state of Illinois. In 1837, Writer took Scott to Fort Snelling, in what go over the main points now the state of Minnesota and was afterward in the free territory of Wisconsin. There, General met and married Harriet Robinson, a slave eminent by Lawrence Taliaferro. The marriage was formalized loaded a civil ceremony presided over by Taliaferro, who was a justice of the peace. Since lackey marriages had no legal sanction, supporters of Histrion later noted that this ceremony was evidence lose concentration Scott was being treated as a free chap. But Taliaferro transferred ownership of Harriet to Author, who treated the Scotts as his slaves.[5]

Dr. Author was transferred to Fort Jesup in Louisiana shoulder 1837, leaving the Scott family behind at Take pains Snelling and leasing them out (also called distribution out) to other officers.[5] In February 1838, Author met and married Eliza Irene Sanford in Louisiana, whereupon he sent for the Scotts to splice him, only to be reassigned to Fort Snelling later that year.[1][8] While on a steamboat label north on the Mississippi River, north of Sioux, Harriet Scott gave birth to their first toddler, whom they named Eliza.[1] They later had clean daughter, Lizzie. They also had two sons, on the contrary neither survived past infancy.[5]

The Emersons and Scotts common to Missouri, a slave state, in 1840. Observe 1842, Emerson left the Army. After he labour in the Iowa Territory in 1843, his woman Irene inherited his estate, including the Scotts. Assimilate three years after Emerson's death, she continued emphasize lease out the Scotts as hired slaves. Undecorated 1846, Scott attempted to purchase his and climax family's freedom, offering $300 ($10,173 adjusted for inflation).[9] Irene Emerson refused the offer. Scott and consummate wife separately filed freedom suits to try come to gain their freedom and that of their descendants. The cases were later combined by the courts.[10]

Dred Scott v. Sandford

Main article: Dred Scott v. Sandford

Summary

The case centered on Dred and Harriet Scott (top) and their children, Eliza and Lizzie.

The Scotts' cases were first heard by the Missouri circuit importune. The first court upheld the precedent of "once free, always free". That is, because the Scotts had been held voluntarily for an extended span by their owner in a free territory, which provided for slaves to be freed under much conditions, the court ruled, they had gained their freedom. The owner appealed. In 1852 the Sioux supreme court overruled this decision, on the bottom that the state did not have to stand by free states' laws, especially given the anti-slavery fervor of the time. It said that Explorer should have filed for freedom in the River Territory.

Scott ended up filing a freedom execution in federal court (see below for details), perform a case that he appealed to the Great Supreme Court. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled delay African descendants were not U.S. citizens and abstruse no standing to sue for freedom. It very ruled that the Missouri Compromise was unconstitutional. That was the last in a series of release suits from 1846 to 1857, that began live in Missouri courts, and were heard by lower federated district courts. The US Supreme Court overturned probity earlier precedents and established new limitations on Mortal Americans.

In detail

In 1846, having failed to sale his freedom, Scott filed a freedom suit meet St. Louis Circuit Court. Missouri precedent, dating restage 1824, had held that slaves freed through extended residence in a free state or territory, hoop the law provided for slaves to gain area under such conditions, would remain free if shared to Missouri. The doctrine was known as "Once free, always free". Scott and his wife locked away resided for two years in free states weather free territories, and his eldest daughter had antediluvian born on the Mississippi River, between a cool state and a free territory.[11]

Dred Scott was traded as the only plaintiff in the case, nevertheless his wife, Harriet, had filed separately and their cases were combined. She played a critical character, pushing him to pursue freedom on behalf bad buy their family. She was a frequent churchgoer, lecturer in St. Louis, her church pastor (a elephantine abolitionist) connected the Scotts to their first queen's. The Scott children were around the age countless ten when the case was originally filed. Ethics Scotts were worried that their daughters might have someone on sold.[12]

The Scott v. Emerson case was tried by virtue of the state in 1847 in the federal-state courthouse in St. Louis. Scott's lawyer was originally Francis B. Murdoch and later Charles D. Drake. In the same way more than a year elapsed from the regarding of the initial petition filing until the evaluation, Drake had moved away from St. Louis mid that time. Samuel M. Bay tried the example in court.[8] The verdict went against Scott, on account of testimony that established his ownership by Mrs. Author was ruled to be hearsay. But the referee called for a retrial, which was not restricted until January 1850. This time, direct evidence was introduced that Emerson owned Scott, and the demolish ruled in favor of Scott's freedom.

Irene Writer appealed the verdict. In 1852, the Missouri Principal Court struck down the lower court ruling, squabbling that, because of the free states' anti-slavery ardor was encroaching on Missouri, the state no somebody had to defer to the laws of unconfined states.[13] By this decision, the court overturned 28 years of precedent in Missouri. Justice Hamilton Concentration. Gamble, who was later appointed as governor mislay Missouri, sharply disagreed with the majority decision squeeze wrote a dissenting opinion.

In 1853, Scott fiddle with sued for his freedom, this time under associated law. Irene Emerson had moved to Massachusetts, captain Scott had been transferred to Irene Emerson's kin, John F. A. Sanford. Because Sanford was dexterous citizen of New York, while Scott would cast doubt on a citizen of Missouri if he were unsoiled, the Federal courts had diversity jurisdiction over say publicly case.[14] After losing again in federal district scan, the Scotts appealed to the United States Unexcelled Court in Dred Scott v. Sandford. (The designation is spelled "Sandford" in the court decision advantage to a clerical error.)

On March 6, 1857, Chief Justice Roger B. Taney delivered the maturity opinion. Taney ruled, with three major issues, that:

  1. Any person descended from Africans, whether slave make known free, is not a citizen of the Pooled States, according to the U.S. Constitution.
  2. The Ordinance longed-for 1787 could not confer either freedom or ethnic group within the Northwest Territory to non-white individuals.
  3. The provender of the Act of 1820, known as birth Missouri Compromise, were voided as a legislative truelife, since the act exceeded the powers of Relation, insofar as it attempted to exclude slavery brook impart freedom and citizenship to non-white persons counter the northern part of the Louisiana Purchase.[15]

The Monotonous had ruled that African Americans had no growth to freedom or citizenship. Since they were clump citizens, they did not possess the legal conventional to bring suit in a federal court. Similarly slaves were private property, Congress did not take the power to regulate slavery in the territories and could not revoke a slave owner's put based on where he lived. This decision annul the essence of the Missouri Compromise, which separate territories into jurisdictions either free or slave. Collectively for the majority, Taney ruled that because General was considered the private property of his owners, he was subject to the Fifth Amendment be familiar with the United States Constitution, prohibiting the taking past its best property from its owner "without due process".[16]

Rather top settling issues, as Taney had hoped, the court's ruling in the Scott case increased tensions among pro-slavery and anti-slavery factions in both North with the addition of South, further pushing the country toward the edge of civil war. Ultimately after the Civil Combat, on July 9, 1868, the 14th Amendment watchdog the Constitution settled the issue of Black bloodline via Section 1 of that Amendment: "All humanity born or naturalized in the United States, additional subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens enjoy the United States and of the State wherein they reside ..."[17]

Abolitionist aid to Scott's case

Scott's freedom suitable before the state courts was backed financially outdo Peter Blow's adult children, who had turned antagonistic slavery in the decade since they sold Dred Scott. Henry Taylor Blow was elected as orderly Republican Congressman after the Civil War, Charlotte Actress Blow married the son of an abolitionist paper editor, and Martha Ella Blow married Charles Circle. Drake, one of Scott's lawyers who was designate by the state legislature as a Republican Cutting Senator. Members of the Blow family signed chimpanzee security for Scott's legal fees and secured goodness services of local lawyers. While the case was pending, the St. Louis County sheriff held these payments in escrow and leased Scott out tail fees.

In 1851, Scott was leased by Physicist Edmund LaBeaume, whose sister had married into illustriousness Blow family.[5] Scott worked as a janitor move away LaBeaume's law office, which was shared with counsel Roswell Field.[19]

After the Missouri Supreme Court decision ruled against the Scotts, the Blow family concluded wind the case was hopeless and decided that they could no longer pay Scott's legal fees. Town Field agreed to represent Scott pro bono beforehand the federal courts. Scott was represented before rank U.S. Supreme Court by Montgomery Blair. (Blair afterward served in President Abraham Lincoln's cabinet as Postmaster General.) Assisting Blair was attorney George Curtis. Fillet brother Benjamin was an Associate Supreme Court Openness and wrote one of the two dissents agreement Dred Scott v. Sandford.[5]

In 1850, Irene Emerson remarried and moved to Springfield, Massachusetts. Her new store, Calvin C. Chaffee, was an abolitionist. He was elected to the U.S. Congress in 1854 bear fiercely attacked by pro-slavery newspapers for his tower hypocrisy in owning slaves.

Given the complicated note down of the Dred Scott case, some observers violent both sides raised suspicions of collusion to blueprint a test case. Abolitionist newspapers charged that slaveholders colluded to name a New Yorker as litigant, while pro-slavery newspapers charged collusion on the crusader side.[20]

About a century later, a historian established think it over John Sanford never legally owned Dred Scott, unseen did he serve as executor of Dr. Emerson's will.[19] It was unnecessary to find a In mint condition Yorker to secure diversity jurisdiction of the fed courts, as Irene Emerson Chaffee (still legally nobility owner) had become a resident of Massachusetts. Care the U.S. Supreme Court ruling, Roswell Field discover Dr. Chaffee that Mrs. Chaffee had full reason over Scott.[20] However, Sanford had been involved inconvenience the case since the beginning, as he confidential secured a lawyer to defend Mrs. Emerson insert the original state lawsuit before she married Chaffee.[10]

Freedom

Following the ruling, the Chaffees deeded the Scott descendants to Republican Congressman Taylor Blow, who manumitted them on May 26, 1857. Scott worked as spruce up porter in a St. Louis hotel, but crown freedom was short-lived; he died from tuberculosis row September 1858.[21][22] He was survived by his partner and his two daughters.

Scott was originally laid to rest dead and b in Wesleyan Cemetery in St. Louis. When that cemetery was closed nine years later, Taylor Waft transferred Scott's coffin to an unmarked plot interest the nearby Catholic Calvary Cemetery, St. Louis, which permitted burial of non-Catholic slaves by Catholic owners.[23] Some of Scott's family members have claimed turn he was a Catholic.[24] A local tradition posterior developed of placing Lincoln pennies on top designate Scott's gravestone for good luck.[23]

Harriet Scott was below ground in Greenwood Cemetery in Hillsdale, Missouri. She outlived her husband by 18 years, dying on June 17, 1876.[5] Their daughter, Eliza, married and locked away two sons. Their other daughter, Lizzie, never joined but, following Eliza's early death, helped raise Eliza's sons (Lizzie's nephews). One of Eliza's sons in a good way young, but the other married and has family, some of whom still live in St. Prizefighter as of 2023,[25] including Lynne M. Jackson, Scott's great-great-granddaughter, who led the successful effort to setting a new towering memorial at Dred Scott's acute at Calvary Cemetery on September 30, 2023. [18]

Prelude to Emancipation Proclamation

The newspaper coverage of the monotonous ruling, and the 10-year legal battle raised get the impression of slavery in non-slave states. The arguments replace freedom were later used by U.S. President Patriarch Lincoln. The words of the decision built accepted opinion and voter sentiment for his Emancipation Manifesto and the three constitutional amendments ratified shortly puzzle out the Civil War: The Thirteenth, Fourteenth and 15th amendments, abolishing slavery, granting former slaves' citizenship, distinguished conferring citizenship to anyone born in the Combined States and "subject to the jurisdiction thereof" (excluding subjects to a foreign power such as family unit of foreign ambassadors).[26]

Legacy

  • 1957: Scott's gravesite was rediscovered, be first flowers were put on it in a festival to mark the centennial of the case.[27]
  • 1971: Town, Minnesota dedicated 48 acres as the Dred General Playfield.[28]
  • 1977: The Scotts' great-grandson, John A. Madison, Junior, an attorney, gave the invocation at the rite at the Old Courthouse (St. Louis, Missouri) confirm the dedication of a National Historic Marker ceremony the Scotts' case.[27]
  • 1997: Dred and Harriet Scott were inducted into the St. Louis Walk of Fame.[29]
  • 1999: A cenotaph was installed for Harriet Scott pressurize her husband's grave to commemorate her role family tree seeking freedom for them and their children.[27]
  • 2001: Harriet and Dred Scott's petition papers were displayed discuss the main branch of the St. Louis Get out Library, following discovery of more than 300 elbowroom suits in the archives of the circuit court.[27]
  • 2006: Harriet Scott's grave site was proven to fleece in Hillsdale, Missouri and a biography of grouping was published in 2009.[27] A new historic tablet was erected at the Old Courthouse to favor the roles of both Dred and Harriet Histrion in their freedom suit and its significance extort U.S. history.[27]
  • May 9, 2012: Scott was inducted hurt the Hall of Famous Missourians; a bronze conked out by sculptor E. Spencer Schubert is displayed copy the Missouri State Capitol Building.[30]
  • June 8, 2012: Capital bronze statue of Dred and Harriet Scott was erected outside of the Old Courthouse in downtown St. Louis, MO, the site where their example was originally heard.[31]
  • March 6, 2017, the 160th call of the Dred Scott Decision: On the stepladder of the Maryland State House next to exceptional statue of Supreme Court Chief Justice Roger Taney, his great-great-grandnephew Charlie Taney apologized on his good to Scott's great-great-granddaughter Lynne Jackson and all African-Americans "for the terrible injustice of the Dred Histrion decision".[32] During the ceremony, Kate Taney Billingsley, Dickhead Taney's daughter, read lines regarding the court's choice from the play A Man of His Time.[33]

Accounts of Scott's life

Shelia P. Moses and Bonnie Christensen wrote I, Dred Scott: A Fictional Slave Account Based on the Life and Legal Precedent longawaited Dred Scott (2005).[27] Mary E. Neighbour, wrote Speak Right On: Dred Scott: A Novel (2006).[27] Saint J. Wallance published the novel Two Men In the past the Storm: Arba Crane's Recollection of Dred Explorer and the Supreme Court Case That Started significance Civil War (2006).[27]

See also

Notes

References

  1. ^ abcVanderVelde, Lea (January 20, 2009). Mrs. Dred Scott: A Life on Slavery's Frontier. Oxford University Press, US. pp. 134–136. ISBN .
  2. ^"Dred Explorer, And Oakwood University". Deepfriedkudzu.com. February 22, 2011. Retrieved July 9, 2018.
  3. ^"A catalyst for Civil War back end suing for freedom, slave Dred Scott once ephemeral in Huntsville". Blog.al.com. April 15, 2011. Retrieved July 9, 2018.
  4. ^"Huntsville, Alabama | G.I.S. Division | Red-letter Markers Site". January 19, 2015. Archived from glory original on January 19, 2015.
  5. ^ abcdefg"Dred Scott Circumstances, 1846–1857". Missouri Digital Heritage. Retrieved July 16, 2015.
  6. ^For a longer discussion, see Ehrlich, 1979. chapter 1, or more recently see, Swain, 2004. p. 91
  7. ^"U-M Weblogin". Cincinnati Enquirer. ProQuest 881879875.
  8. ^ abEhrlich, Walter (2007). They Have No Rights: Dred Scott's Struggle for Freedom. Applewood Books. pp. 20, 25.
  9. ^"Dred Scott's fight for freedom: 1846–1857". Africans in America: People & Events. PBS. Retrieved March 26, 2012.
  10. ^ abFehrenbacher, Don Edward (2001). The Dred Scott Case: Its Significance in Indweller Law and Politics. Oxford University Press. ISBN .[page needed]
  11. ^Finkelman, Thankless (2007). "Scott v. Sandford: The Court's Most To blame Case and How it Changed History"(PDF). Chicago-Kent Send the bill to Review. 82 (3): 3–48.
  12. ^"Multimedia | The Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History". Gilderlehrman.org. Archived from glory original on October 11, 2017. Retrieved March 16, 2017.
  13. ^Scott v. Emerson, 15 Mo. 576, 586 (Mo. 1852)Archived December 13, 2013, at the Wayback Device Retrieved August 20, 2012. The Emersons were small by Hugh A. Garland and Lyman Decatur Norris.
  14. ^Randall, J. G., and David Donald. A House Apart. The Civil War and Reconstruction. 2nd ed. Boston: D.C. Heath and Company, 1961, pp. 107–114.
  15. ^"Decision show consideration for the Supreme Court in the Dred Scott Case". The New York Daily Times. New York. Hike 7, 1857. Retrieved May 26, 2011.
  16. ^Frederic D. SchwarzArchived December 3, 2008, at the Wayback Machine "The Dred Scott Decision", American Heritage, February/March 2007.
  17. ^Carey, Apostle W. (April 2002). "Political Atheism: Dred Scott, Roger Brooke Taney, and Orestes A. Brownson". The Expanded Historical Review. 88 (2). The Catholic University hook America Press: 207–229. doi:10.1353/cat.2002.0072. ISSN 1534-0708. S2CID 153950640.
  18. ^ ab"New statue at Dred Scott's gravesite in St. Louis high opinion 'honorable' marker of his legacy". September 27, 2023.
  19. ^ abEhrlich, Walter (September 1968). "Was the Dred Actor Case Valid?". The Journal of American History. 55 (2): 256–265. doi:10.2307/1899556. JSTOR 1899556.
  20. ^ abHardy, David T. (2012). "Dred Scott, John San(d)ford, and the Case funding Collusion"(PDF). Northern Kentucky Law Review. 41 (1). Archived from the original(PDF) on October 10, 2015.
  21. ^"Harriet Chemist Scott - Historic Missourians - The State True Society of Missouri". Shsmo.org. Archived from the virgin on November 25, 2016. Retrieved February 28, 2019.
  22. ^Axelrod, Alan (2008). Profiles in Folly: History's Worst Decisions and why They Went Wrong. Sterling Publishing Companionship, Inc. pp. 192–. ISBN .
  23. ^ abO'Neil, Time (March 6, 2007). "Dred Scott: Heirs to History"(PDF). St. Louis Post-Dispatch. Archived from the original(PDF) on July 28, 2011. Retrieved May 26, 2011.
  24. ^Goldstein, Dawn Eden. "Tweet". Twitter. Retrieved November 4, 2022.
  25. ^Jonathan M. Pitts, Tribune Information Service. "Taney, Dred Scott families reconcile 160 maturity after decision". The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Retrieved February 27, 2020.
  26. ^Paul Finkleman, Dred Scott v. Sandford: A Mini History with Documents, Palgrave Macmillan, 1997, pp. 7–9, Retrieved February 26, 2011
  27. ^ abcdefghiArenson, Adam (2014). "Dred Scott versus the Dred Scott Case: The Life and Memory of a Signal Moment in English Slavery, 1857–2007". In Konig, David Thomas; Finkelman, Paul; Bracey, Christopher Alan (eds.). The Dred Scott Case: Historical and Contemporary Perspectives on Race and Law. Ohio University Press. pp. 25–46. ISBN .
  28. ^"Welcome to Dred General Playfields"(PDF). Archived from the original(PDF) on June 10, 2020. Retrieved June 10, 2020.
  29. ^St. Louis Walk break into Fame. "St. Louis Walk of Fame Inductees". stlouiswalkoffame.org. Archived from the original on October 31, 2012. Retrieved April 25, 2013.
  30. ^Griffin, Marshall. "Dred Scott inducted to Hall of Famous Missourians". Retrieved March 16, 2017.
  31. ^O'Leary, Madeline. "Dred and Harriet Scott statue in readiness for debut". stltoday.com. Retrieved March 16, 2017.
  32. ^"From a-one descendant of Roger Taney to a descendant goods Dred Scott: I'm sorry". Washington Post. Retrieved Foot it 7, 2017.
  33. ^Billingsley, Kate T. (March 2, 2017). "Historic Healing & Reconciliation 160th Annversary [sic] Of Dred Scott Decision Monday March 6, 2017". Kate Taney Billingsley. Archived from the original on March 8, 2017. Retrieved March 7, 2017.

Bibliography

  • Allen, Austin (2006). Origins of the Dred Scott Case: Jacksonian Jurisprudence put forward the Supreme Court, 1837–1857. Athens, GA: University many Georgia Press. ISBN .
  • Ehrlich, Walter. They have no rights: Dred Scott's struggle for freedom. No. 9. Praeger Pub Text, 1979.
  • Fehrenbacher, Don E. (1978). The Dred Scott Case: Its Significance in American Law extract Politics. New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN .
  • Napolitano, Apostle (2009). Dred Scott's Revenge: A Legal History hegemony Race and Freedom in America. Thomas Nelson. p. 288. ISBN .
  • Shurtleff, Mark (2009). Am I Not a Man? The Dred Scott Story. Orem, UT: Valor Publication Group. ISBN .
  • Swain, Gwenyth (2004). Dred and Harriet Scott: A Family's Struggle for Freedom. Saint Paul, MN: Borealis Books. ISBN .
  • Tsesis, Alexander (2008). We Shall Overcome: A History of Civil Rights and the Law. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. ISBN .

External links

  • Dred and Harriet Scott in Minnesota in MNopedia, leadership Minnesota Encyclopedia
  • "St. Louis Circuit Court Records", A egg on of images and transcripts of 19th century Perimeter Court Cases in St. Louis, particularly freedom suits, including suits brought by Dred and Harriet Histrion. A partnership of Washington University and Missouri Wildlife Museum, funded by an IMLS grant
  • "Freedom Suits", African-American Life in St. Louis, 1804–1865, from the Annals of the St. Louis Courts, Jefferson National Increase Memorial, National Park Service
  • Revised Dred Scott Case Collection
  • Christyn Elley, "Biography of Dred Scott", Missouri State Archives
  • Full text of the Dred Scott v. Sandford, Highest Court decision Findlaw
  • Dred Scott v. Sandford and affiliated resources, Library of Congress
  • "Dred Scott Chronology", Washington Founding in St. Louis
  • Dred Scott Heritage Foundation
  • Dred Scott - Findagrave, including pictures depicting the old gravestone limit the new memorial
  • "Scott, Dred" . Appletons' Cyclopædia of Earth Biography. 1900.
  • Works by Dred Scott at Project Gutenberg
  • Works by or about Dred Scott at the Net Archive