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To: misterwhite
True, as disgusting as it was, the ruling followed the law and the U.S. Constitution.

Nope. The ruling was in error, as can be easily seen by reading the two dissents.

In quite a few of the states at the time of the Constitutional Convention, free blacks were full citizens, complete with voting rights. So when the Preamble refers to "We the people of the United States," it includes those free blacks in those states. Though, to be fair, it did not include slaves or free blacks in the states that did not consider free blacks citizens.

Taney just ignores these facts and proclaims what he thinks the Founders meant, deciding quite without a shred of evidence that when they said, "We the people of the United States," they really meant "We the people of the Unites States, except of course for any people who have African ancestry."

The Founders were not idiots. Had they intended to say any such thing, they certainly could have done so. It is the height of arrogance for Taney, or anyone else, to determine decades after the fact what they really meant to say.

In essence, Taney was proclaiming a "living Constitution," one that needed to "move with the times," and keep up with modern (southern) opinion.

36 posted on 10/21/2011 12:38:41 PM PDT by Sherman Logan
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To: Sherman Logan
"In quite a few of the states at the time of the Constitutional Convention, free blacks were full citizens, complete with voting rights."

So we're clear, Taney was referring to Africans who were slaves at the time, who were slaves then were freed, or who were descendants of slaves.

In response to your statement, I'm sure there were some free blacks who were citizens of their state complete with voting rights. But they were not citizens of the United States (according to Taney).

At the time of the Constitutional Convention, the phrase "the people" had a specific meaning. It did not mean all persons or even all citizens. It referred to those who were full citizens -- those who could vote, run for any office, and who owned land (rich, white, adult male citizens). This excluded women, children, slaves, foreigners, and visitors.

"The people" were in charge and they had the most to lose. The U.S. Constitution was written for them (unless specified otherwise).

38 posted on 10/21/2011 1:22:12 PM PDT by misterwhite
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