Civil War Era

Front 1

Mayor of NY v. Miln (1837)

Statute required boat captains to report and pay for non-citizens (other states/foreign)

Back 1

**SC Upheld statute

STATE'S POLICE POWER: regulate for health, safety, welfare, morals of people

COMMERCE: Persons are not articles of commerce

Front 2

Passenger Cases (1849)

NY/Mass tax on incoming passengers to finance health care for foreign paupers

Back 2

**Court invalidated laws, but divided on state control over slavery

POLICE POWER: states ability to expel any citizen they deemed dangerous and to allow citizenship to whomever they please

Front 3

Cooley v. Board of Wardens (1851)

Penn statute requiring the use of local pilot to navigate in and out of port. Fee for non-compliance

Back 3

COMMERCE: congress has power to regulate subjects that are in nature national; pilot was state subject, therefore right belonged to state

**attempt to help in-state business at the expense of out-of-staters (later consistently ruled unconstitutional)

Front 4

Groves v. Slaughter (1841)

Back 4

**Interstate Slave Trade

COMMERCE: Slaves are not items of commerce, therefore states have power to regulate sale of slaves

Front 5

Fugitive Slave Act of 1793

Prigg v. Pennsylvania (1842)

state law making use of force or violence to remove slave from state back into slavery illegal; Prigg taken from his family

Back 5

FSA: Federal law requiring judges to return escaped slaves

**SC relied upon FSA to deem state law unconst. and states cannot interfere with the return of fugitive slaves

NECESSARY/PROPER: congressional authority to enforce FSA, although slavery is what is driving this case, not const.

Front 6

Dred Scott v. Sandford (1857)

Are slaves citizens of the U.S. and able to sue in federal court?

Back 6

State citizen not the same as U.S. citizen, and states do not have the power to make a U.S. citizen.

ORIGINALISM: Slaves not citizens at ratification; Framers did not mean for slaves to be citizens

Front 7

Constitutionality of MIssouri Compromise (1820)

36 30 would be line dividing free and slave territories

Back 7

COngress lacks authority to prohibit slavery in territories:

1) US acquires a territory on behalf of all people, cannot impose Northern views above Southern views
2) Territories not same as colonies, American citizens in territories should be allowed to have their property
3) Govt cannot take property of A and give it to B (take slaves from slave owners and give them freedom)

Front 8

Ex Parte Merryman (1861)

Confederate officer imprisoned during Lincoln's suspense of habeas corpus.

Back 8

**Taney states that Art I gives Congress right to suspension, not executive
(Taney friend of Merryman's Dad)

Lincoln's response:
suspension clause doesn't state that ONLY congress can do so; lesser of two evils - necessary to keep Union

Front 9

Prize Cases (1863)

Lincoln refused to declare war on South (would recognize confederate as nation) instead instituted a naval port blockade

Back 9

President cannot declare war, but can immediately repel invasion and respond to attack w/o violating const.

**dissent said Lincoln had to recognize South as nation b/f going to war

Front 10

Ex Parte Milligan (1866)

Court marshall and tried in military court

Back 10

Ruled Lincoln's suspension of Habeas Corpus was constitutional, but military tribunal do not apply to citizens when the civil courts are up and running, even during war.

Front 11

Emancipation Proclamation (1863)

Frees all the slaves in the South

Back 11

Strategic measure to try to encourage slaves to fight with the Union. Stated that all slaves were free if Confederate states didn't return to the Union by a specific date.

WAR POWERS: only freed slaves in areas where the Union was still at war
**dissent: dangerous to nullify state laws, like a dictatorship

Front 12

Frederick Douglas Speech (1860)

Back 12

1) 3/5 Clause encourages an end to slavery; more representation
2) slave trade ending at 1808 attempt to end slavery all together
3) Congress may put down insurrections; easiest way is to end slavery
4) fugitive slave clause 'indentured servants' -- can't owe service as property

Front 13

Kansas - Nebraska Act 1854

Repeals the Missouri Compromise

Back 13

Settlers could decide whether or not to have slavery in territories in name of 'popular sovereignty'

Divided the nation and pointed it towards civil war.