was quietly
admitted, directly after the seceding Senators abandoned their seats,
their votes having kept it out up to that time. The population of the
United States in 1860 was 31,443,321. Prosperity prevailed everywhere,
and, but for the darkening shadows of civil war, the condition of no
people could have been more happy and promising.

THE DRED SCOTT DECISION.

Dred Scott was the negro slave of Dr. Emerson, of Missouri, a surgeon in
the United States army. In the discharge of his duty, his owner took him
to military posts in Illinois and Minnesota. Scott married a negro woman
in Minnesota, and both were sold by Dr. Emerson upon his return to
Missouri. The negro brought suit for his freedom on the ground that he
had been taken into territory where slavery was forbidden. The case
passed through the various State courts, and, reaching the United States
Supreme Court, that body made its decision in March, 1857.

This decision was to the effect that negro slaves were not citizens, and
no means existed by which they could become such; they were simply
property like household goods and chattels, and their owner could take
them into any State in the Union without forfeiting his ownership in
them. It followed also from this important decision that the Missouri
Compromise of 1820 and the Compromise of 1850 were null and void, since
it was beyond the power of the contracting parties to make such
agreements. Six of the justices concurred in this decision and two
dissented.

[Illustration: LUCRETIA MOTT PROTECTING THE NEGRO DANGERFIELD FROM THE
MOB IN PHILADELPHIA.

When Daniel Dangerfield, a fugitive slave, was tried in Philadelphia,
Lucretia Mott sat during all his trial by the side of the prisoner. When
the trial was ended Dangerfield was set at liberty, and Mrs. Mott walked
out of the court-room and through the mob which threatened to lynch him,
her hand on the colored man's arm, and that little hand was a sure
protector, for no one dared to touch him.]

This decision was received with delight in the South and repudiated in
the North. The contention there was that the Constitution regarded
slaves as "persons held to labor" and not as property, and that they
were property only by State law.

JOHN BROWN'S RAID.

While the chasm between the North and South was rapidly growing wider, a
startling occurrence took place. John Brown was a fanatic who believed
Heaven had appointed him its agent for freeing the slaves i