sought to conciliate Northern sentiment by appending to his Kansas-Nebraska bill the declaration that its intent was “not to legislate slavery into any State or Territory, nor to exclude it therefrom, but to leave the people thereof perfectly free to form and regulate their institutions in their own way, subject only to the Constitution of the United States.” This he called “the great principle of popular sovereignty.” When asked whether, under this act, the people of a Territory, before its admission as a State, would have the right to exclude slavery, he answered, “That is a question for the courts to decide.” Then came the famous “Dred Scott decision,” in which the Supreme Court held substantially that the right to hold slaves as property existed in the Territories by virtue of the Federal Constitution, and that this right could not be denied by any act of a territorial government. This, of course, denied the right of the people of any Territory to exclude slavery while they were
