The Passenger Cases and the Commerce Clause: Immigrants, Blacks, and States' Rights in Antebellum America

by Tony Allan Freyer and Tony A. Freyer

Book Overview

In 1849 Chief Justice Taney's Court delivered a 5-4 decision on the legal status of immigrants and free blacks under the federal commerce power. The closely divided decision, further emphasized by the fact there were eight opinions, played a part in the increasingly contested politics over growing immigration, and the controversies about fugitive slaves and the western expansion of slavery that resulted in the Compromise of 1850.

In the decades...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0700620095
• ISBN13: 9780700620098
• Release Date: December 2014
• Publisher: University Press of Kansas
• Length: 240 Pages
• Weight: 0.50 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 5.5" x 8.4"