the decision in the legal case of the American Negro slave Dred Scott. The case was heard at different levels of the court system and started in 1848, when Scott asked the court to declare him a free man since for four years, from 1834 to 1838, he had lived with his master in the free states of Illinois and Wisconsin. In 1857 the US Supreme Court declared Scott a slave. The decision implied that a slave was his master’s property even in free states; it reflected the desire of the slaveholders to extend slavery to the whole country. The Dred Scott decision caused numerous protests in the USA and contributed to the strengthening of the abolitionist movement.