WI: No Dred Scott Case?

The problem here is that Chief Justice Taney was chomping at the bit to write a 'definitive' opinion. Taney was a 'property' jurist and really wanted to fix the slave law into that field (not contract or regular civil law). So I expect he would have looked around for another similar case to use.

JC
 
Well, while it was certainly a huge can of gasoline thrown onto a raging inferno, I'm not sure this alone could delay the ACW too much if at all.

Simply put, by the time Dred Scott came about (1857) Bleeding Kansas had already been going (John Brown had been involved for two years), Brooks had already attacked Sumner...in other words the "war" over slavery was already happening.

The biggest possible butterfly is that OTL it spurred Lincoln's "House Divided" speach, so maybe Lincoln never gets the Republican nom in 1860. Maybe without the controversy in how this contradicted Northern Democrat's "popular sovereignty" banner Douglas and company aren't as discredited...and so maybe there isn't such a massive split in the Dems leading to the OTL three-party run...

...soooo, I guess we could see Fremont (or whoever repalces Lincoln) defeated by a (somewhat) unified Democratic ticket...possibly delaying the inevitable a few years. Biggest short-term butterflies will IMO be specific to individual politicians' careers.
 
The Kansas-Nebraska Act had already killed the Missouri Compromise of 1820 and opened the territories to slavery. Dredd Scott was just salt on the wound. And as other have said both Taney and Buchanan were aching to have a slave property case reach the Supreme Court. It may be possible to delay its effect by a year or so but Lemmon was coming out of New York soon so that case could have been heard by the Supreme Court sometime in 1858 or so.

Benjamin
 
Good call on Lemmon...basically the same sort of case ("I was in a free state, so I'm free") and the verdict and associated overstepping will parallel OTL. In that case I rescind my earlier thoughts. ITTL Lincoln cites the Lemmon Case, which becomes TTL's Dred Scott analog. Little chance of a major change to OTL baring some wacky butterflies.
 
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