The Dred Scott decision of 1857 is almost certainly the darkest moment in the history of the U.S.

Supreme Court and American jurisprudence. It wasn’t just a case about one man’s quest for
freedom, it was emblematic of a broad, still unresolved crisis of slavery, one that had been
festering from the country’s founding. It is nearly 250 years after Africans arrived in the USA’s
shores, the country’s highest court ruled essentially that African Americans were not real people
under the law, nothing more than people of color. The Dred Scott case marked the Supreme
Court’s decision to say that Congress had no power to stop the spread of slavery to any
territory. The opinion of the majority, delivered by Chief Justice Roger B. Taney, a staunch
southerner, was that Dred Scott, a Black man, and all Black people, were never, and no Black
people could ever be, citizens of the United States. And so, white men owed them no rights. It
stunned African Americans and abolitionists alike with Taney’s words. For Northerners, it was a
legal basis for extending slavery to new territories, hardening North against South, for African
Americans, it was the literal erasure of their humanity in the public’s eyes. This decision carried
wide and far reaching ramifications. That just further strengthened the institution of slavery as
one of the boiling points of tensions over its future had been reached. It was a validation for
Southern slaveholders, an economy and a social system. It emboldened them to push even
harder for even larger and more protective laws for slavery, and to demand a federal slave code
governing all U.S. territories. The need for that, of course, was completely unacceptable to
Northerners who were getting louder all the time about opposing the extension of slavery. The
issue of slavery, that was itself already dividing the political process, raised the battle between
the proslavery and the anti-slavery factions to a standstill. The violence spilled both inside
government chambers and in the streets. In one very infamous incident, Congressman Preston
Brooks from South Carolina entered the Senate chamber and beat a notorious blazing
abolitionist, Senator Charles Sumner, so badly he went unconscious. Violence that was so
shocking signaled the end of civil discourse and a race over slavery growing more polarized. It
also looked forward to more violence.

But in the midst of this partisan turmoil it was 1860 when all eyes turned to the presidential
election. Abraham Lincoln, the Republican nominee, was the candidate of the Free Soil
platform, an anti slavery expansion into new territories. Lincoln’s election was a major event in
the process of the making of the United States. In an election for the first time, a candidate was
elected without carrying a single Southern state. Lincoln had pledged not to interfere with
slavery where it already existed, and Southern slave owners all saw it as an existential threat to
them to interfere, too, to prevent slavery from expanding into new territories. Lincoln’s election
was to them the victory of the extremely radical abolitionist opponents who wanted to destroy
their way of life, however moderate Lincoln’s actual views may have been. Seven Southern
states seceded from the Union even before Lincoln formed office to comprise the Confederate
States of America. Soon word of Southern secession was spreading, and enslaved people
throughout the South hoped for a future without slavery. The secession, of course, was terrifying
for the country as a whole. Civil war was afoot in the United States. But the nation founded on
liberty and equality was now at war over whether human beings could legally be owned as
property.
During this same period, the 1860 presidential election brought all eyes. Abraham Lincoln, the
Republican nominee, was the candidate of the Free Soil platform, an anti slavery expansion into
new territories. Lincoln’s election was a major event in the process of the making of the United
States. In an election for the first time, a candidate was elected without carrying a single
Southern state. Lincoln had pledged not to interfere with slavery where it already existed, and
Southern slave owners all saw it as an existential threat to them to interfere, too, to prevent
slavery from expanding into new territories. Lincoln’s election was to them the victory of the
extremely radical abolitionist opponents who wanted to destroy their way of life, however
moderate Lincoln’s actual views may have been. Seven Southern states seceded before
Lincoln took office to form the Confederate States of America, but Lincoln never took office.
Soon word of Southern secession was spreading, and enslaved people throughout the South
hoped for a future without slavery. The secession, of course, was terrifying for the country as a
whole. Civil war was afoot in the United States. But the nation founded on liberty and equality
was now at war over whether human beings could legally be owned as property.These soldier
were not only combating to defend the country, but also to liberate themselves and their
upcoming generations.

When the Civil War started in 1861 this war was presented as the war to save the Union not the
war against slavery. The early war that many referred to as a “white man’s war for Union”
showed scant concern for the query of Black emancipation. Both the North and the South saw
the war as a contest between different visions of the nation’s future: North struggling for a united
state and the South for its independence for slavery preservation Institution.. Thus, enslaved
and free African Americans, however, viewed the war in quite a different way. And many of them
began to act to ensure that their destiny was linked to the outcome of this war, for them it was
freedom. Perhaps the most dramatic escape early on the most defiant part of African Americans
was Robert Smalls. A native of South Carolina, Smalls was a slave who had served at the
*Planter* as the pilot of the Confederate ship. In 1862 he successfully undertook a daring
operation: he and several other enslaved sailors took control of the vessel he commanded, and
brought it to the Union Navy. This act of bravery not only emancipated Smalls and his family but
also earned him and his family a title of National Black hero. It ran across the country and
globally with the story of his escape helping inspire other enslaved people across the South to
fight for freedom. The story of Smalls demonstrates the part African Americans played in
emancipation of themselves. After the booming of the first shots at Sumter the question of black
participation in the fighting wasn’t openly raised for the Union soldiery to consider: it stood
before the bare fact of an exodus of the enslaved from their Confederate chattel-masters to
Union protection, and could not avoid grappling with the issue. The federal government allowed
the formation of Negro regiments in 1862, and many thousands of colored men came forward to
enlist for the Union.

While there were definitely key events that impacted the Civil War, the point of no return in
people’s mind was in 1863, when president Abraham Lincoln issued his Emancipation
Proclamation. Although the proclamation only applied to South States that were still rebelling
against the Union, it has connection with shifting events of the war and the blacks. To the
enslaved peoples of the Confederacy, it was the proclamation of their liberty, they applied the
proclamation to themselves most readily, whether or not they were in Union-occupied territory.
The proclamation also has opened the Union army for black men and thousands of the African
Americans went to fight for their freedom. The civil war was longer just a struggle for the
preservation of the Union it had turned into a war for liberty.

Not surprisingly, the decision to issue the emancipation proclamation was not well received by
many people in the North. Some sections of the Union populace saw no reason as to why they
should go to war to free blacks and Union enrollment fell after the announcement. However, for
the blacks in America, particularly the Africans, the announcement was gradual stride towards
black’s desire of freedom. It changed somewhat the position of the federal government with
regard to slavery and defined the conditions of the beginning of the process of the abolition of
slavery on the territory of the United States.

Although the Civil War came to a close in 1865, abolishing slavery in general in states of
America, it was not a certain day to freedom for the Black man. Reconstruction which was
between 1865 and 1877 was one of expectations and failure. African Americans were given
citizenship and the right to vote for the first time and a large number of them participate in the
management of the nation. Such people as Robert Smalls went into politics and, in fact, blacks
dominated some state legislatures.

Reconstruction also brought into office the Freedmen’s Bureau an agency formed with the aim
of assisting newly emancipated Africans. Bureau gave food, clothing, housing, education, and
legal services to the black people in order to help them set up new lives after liberation from
slavery. To increase enrollment, Baptist trained teachers supplied schools for African Americans
across the South, many children of former slaves had probably never gone to school before.
But, Reconstruction was opposed by white southerners who refused to have any bit of this
changed taking root as they wanted to remain in charge. They themselves used terror and
violence to undermine the vote of the black citizens hence ending the promised representation
by the government, KKK and other white supremacist groups. Though there had been actions
taken by federal troops and civil rights legislation ad rejected the violence persisted and the
gains of reconstruction reversed. By the mid 1870s white supremacy became a noteworthy
overt political current dominated by the Democratic Party.

The ending of reconstruction was therefore sounded by the Compromise of 1877. This has
been true evidenced by the fact that Rutherford B. Hayes became president through a
compromise in 1876 after a heavily disputed presidency election, after the agreement Hayes
became president, in return the republicans removed there military forces from the south. This
compromise ended the reconstruction period and put the coloured people in mercy of the white
southerners who where Democrats who wanted to push for African Americans back into their
former position. While the was the solutions which set into motion a process that ultimately
culminated in the era of Jim crow, which was an era characterized by racism and oppression
that lasted for almost a century. Vote was taken away from African Americans and the rights
given to them during reconstruction were abolished. This documentary as a whole focuses on
the fight for African American liberation, voting rights, and enfranchisement in the United States
of and after the Civil War.

Video key events:

The Dred Scott Decision (1857) : The ruling of this Supreme Court was that African Americans
were not citizens and had no rights which would be respected by white Americans. This ruling
denied any federal action in checking expansion of slavery deepened conflict between the North
and the South resulting in the civil war. The language of the decision even though delivered by
Chief Justice Roger Taney, was even more crushing to the blacks since it stripped them of their
existence under the law and continued to uphold the might of the slave masters from the south .

Violence in Congress: The political fieldValue during this period can be described as rather
unstable. For instance, the documentary gives details of the cane beating of Senator Charles
Sumner by Congressman Preston Brooks to represent the splits of antislavery and slavery
supporters. Such violence as this, even in the government building, represented the emerging
national controversy over the issue of slavery.

The Election of Abraham Lincoln (1860): Lincoln was elected, without placing even a single
state of the South, and many Southerners believed this meant the imminent destruction of
slavery. Despite the fact that Lincoln wanted initially only to curtail the spread of slavery, his
election caused the southern states to secede, and led to the war. To the slaveowners in the
South, Lincoln and the Republicans were perceived as being controlled by the “ossified
abolitionists,” even though the latter had not yet come out in a crusade for the elimination of
slavery, which Lincoln himself in his campaign did not seek either.

The Civil War and Robert Smalls : Perhaps one of most stirring narratives in the documentary is
a tale of Robert Smalls, a black man who rose through the ranks of the Confederate navy only
to defect to the Union navy by capturing an armed schooner, The *Planter*. This brave action
not only added sort of the hero to Smalls but also an expression of the desire of the African
Americans to defend their own freedom.

*The Emancipation Proclamation (1863): Lincoln’s proclamation change the nature of the civil
war from being a war for union to a war for the freedom of the slaves. Though it actually only
emancipated the slaves in the Confederate states, it raised the morale of the enslaved Africans
and change the tide of the war. It was political and military declaration, which urged thousands
of African Americans to join the Union Army and become free men.

Post-War Reconstruction: During the period after the war, other efforts were made to reconstruct
the south with the newly set free African Americans. It also encompassed the formation of the
Federal Bureau for the liberated slave and the endeavors made to give them and other blacks
education and political power. till here these attempts were made but there were loads of
obstacles mostly from southern whites who could not digest the fact that black people are equal
to whites both socially and politically.
Violence and the Rise of the Ku Klux Klanu: Alas one of the infamous features of the
Reconstruction period was violent reaction to the black political enfranchisement. KKK, the KKK
and other white supremacist organizations employed force and Thurmand to prevent Black’s
political activity especially in the South. The documentary gives detailed examples of the terror
among which the Hamburg massa cer committed by whites against Black militia are described.
Such kind of violence continued to show that the struggle for humanity for the blacks in America
was still ongoing.

The Compromise of 1877: This political bargain brought the era of Reconstruction to a close by
pulling the Federal provision out of the South, thereby letting the white Democrat party win all of
the Southern states. The compromise which solved the contentious issue of presidential
election of 1876 caused untold hardship to the blacks who only enjoyed whatever rights they
had on the protection of federal government. This protection was abolished to ultimately
disempower the Black voters which in turn paved the way for ‘Jim Crow laws’, wherein,
segregation and rather discrimination against the blacks would continue for many years.

Robert Smalls' Political Career: However, there were some African Americans who were able to
establish themselves politically during reconstruction amongst them Robert Smalls. Smalls
worked in the legislative assembly of South Carolina and then as a member of the U.S. House
of Representatives, which presented the image of the black populace’s political progress. Still,
Smalls was not an exception – he was also accused of corruption with the purpose to weaken
his political power.

The documentary gives an inspiring yet sad at times picture of the African American fight for
liberty and civil rights. The first major issue is how short-lived the achievements of
reconstruction were, as the next section will soon illustrate. After the civil war, the blacks.locally
referred to as African Americans, managed to secure their right to vote, get employed in politics,
and establish their own businesses, after which they were brought back to life by white racists.
Among these, the most notorious perhaps is the Compromise of 1877 where the federal
government effectively left the newly freed black population to the vagaries of the South’s newly
emerged white masters.

The other issue is the countless cases of the systemic violence and terror that diminish African
Americans’ rights. Employment of the Ku Klux Klan and political terrorism were sure signs that
most white Americans were ready to reign down terror for African Americans to never have the
chance at equality again. That such strategies were so successful and that the federal
government was often unable or perhaps unwilling to counter them is disquieting.

Also, the documentary reveals the profound paradoxes of American democracy in detail. The
country was built on the fundamental principle of the liberties and equality of men, but those
principles did not apply to black people in this country. Freedom and citizenship that the
Emancipation Proclamation and the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments to the Constitution
offered African Americans were unconvincing because they remained unenforced and
unprotected from legal chicanes and extralegal hostility.
All in all, the given documentary can be regarded examples of the social victory and the juridical
failure of the African American fight for liberation. The story of individuals like Robert Smalls is
inspiring, the partisan violence, and effective disenfranchisement of the Black vote, and the
abandonment by a federal government demonstrate how hard that fight was. This legacy
persists to the present day in America because many of those questions are still unanswered
today.