What was the Supreme Court's decision in the Dred Scott case?

The Dred Scott case involved two separate issues. One was whether Scott, as an enslaved man, had a right to sue in court. The other was whether Scott, having spent some of his life in free territory, was even enslaved at all. On the first issue, the Court ruled that Scott had no right to sue in court, and indeed that, as a black man, had "no rights a white man was bound to respect."...

The Dred Scott case involved two separate issues. One was whether Scott, as an enslaved man, had a right to sue in court. The other was whether Scott, having spent some of his life in free territory, was even enslaved at all. On the first issue, the Court ruled that Scott had no right to sue in court, and indeed that, as a black man, had "no rights a white man was bound to respect." These were the words of Chief Justice Roger Taney, who further ruled that Scott had not in fact become free by living in free territory. In fact, he went well beyond the issues raised in the case by asserting that the Missouri Compromise, which declared most of the northern portion of the Louisiana Purchase free territory, was unconstitutional. The Court's decision basically invalidated attempts to restrain the spread of slavery into the territories. Predictably, this outraged antislavery Northerners and delighted Southerners. It also raised questions about whether popular sovereignty, the preferred remedy to the issue of slavery's expansion, was constitutional. When northern Democrats continued to advocate this solution, southerners bolted from the party in 1860.