Freemen

Oh, thus be it ever when freemen shall stand. Between their loved home and the war’s desolation: blest with vict’ry and peace, may the heav’n-rescued land Praise the Power that has made and preserved us a nation.

On March 6, 1857, the United States Supreme Court rules on the case of Dred Scott v. Sandford, effectively declaring that blacks, slaves or freemen, could not be U.S. citizens. Furthermore, it ruled that the Missouri Compromise of 1820, which ensured pro- and anti-slavery states would be added to the union in pairs to preserve balance, was unconstitutional. The decision inflamed and widened the differences between pro- and anti-slavery Americans, ultimately leading to the Civil War.