City aims for balance with Dred Scott plaque

More than 150 years after the U.S. Supreme Court issued the notorious Dred Scott decision affirming slavery, a Maryland city erects a plaque to educate visitors about the decision.

Maryland Court of Appeals Chief Judge Robert Bell, center, unveils a plaque honoring Dred and Harriet Scott during a ceremony Tuesday in Frederick, Md. Rob Carr / AP
SHARE THIS —
/ Source: The Associated Press

More than 150 years after the U.S. Supreme Court issued the notorious Dred Scott decision affirming slavery, a Maryland city has erected a plaque to educate visitors about the decision and the local man who wrote it.

Recommended

Israel-Hamas war'You are our hope': Gaza students find strength in U.S. campus protests

The bronze marker was dedicated Tuesday at Frederick city hall on a granite pedestal about eight feet from a bronze bust of Chief Justice Roger Brooke Taney. The one-time Frederick resident wrote the 1857 decision, which also held that freed slaves and their descendants could never be U.S. citizens. The case became a catalyst for the Civil War.

The plaque is a compromise between residents who wanted the Taney statue removed and those who believe it deserves the place of honor it has occupied for 77 years.