They were followers of Clay, and not to be trusted by the new South in any exigency where the interests of slavery and the perpetuity of the Union should come in conflict.

Instead, therefore, of strengthening the Democratic party, the whole effect of the Dred Scott decision was to develop a more determined type of anti-slavery agitation.

This tendency was promoted by the lucid and exhaustive opinion of Benjamin R.Curtis, one of the two dissenting judges.

Judge Curtis was not a Republican.

He had been a Whig of the most conservative type, appointed to the bench by President Fillmore through the influence of Mr.Webster and the advice of Rufus Choate.