National & Minnesota Report
Our concern for the US Supreme Court exist as citizens of this nation and as amateur Constitutional scholars. The Internet is a fine repository of Constitutional works and means we do not need to dig through old boxes for our Constitutional Law books. Here we once again acknowledge Professor Samuel Krislov, is currently Distinguished Alumni Adjunct Professor of Public Administration at American University and Emeritus Professor of Political Science and Law at the University of Minnesota.
As we have been considering the potential adverse impact of this election should Donald J Trump (R) be returned to the White House, we were reminded of the pre-Civil War Court under the Roger B Taney. The Taney Court decisions likely led us into the Civil War.
The three that come to mind are:
Prigg v. Pennsylvania | 41 U.S. 539 (1842) which upheld the Fugitive Slave Act of 1793 and additionally the allowance of the Missouri Supreme Court position on the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850.
Dred Scott v. Sandford (1857)
The court’s declaration of even a freed slave never being allowed to become an American citizen and if a slave enters a free state, that person is still enslaved. Yes, dear readers this is when Mr Scott was brought here to Minnesota to Fort Snelling by Dr John Emerson, a US Army Surgeon.
This decision is considered the worst ever made by the US Supreme Court.
It is arguable the Fugitive Slaves Acts are under the same premise as a woman not being able to leave her anti-abortion state to peruse the medical procedure in another state.
These decisions, are telling in the nature of the current Roberts Court. The restrictions imposed by an anti-abortion state preclude a woman from exercising her full rights as a citizen to pursue necessary medical care and has resulted in the deaths of women in a number of states, and medical crisis’s for others.
As we await the results, the costs of Trump’s election could not be any higher.