Read the passage from the opinion of the court in Dred Scott v. Sandford, written by Justice Taney.The question before us is, whether the class of persons described in the plea in abatement compose a portion of this people, and are constituent members of this sovereignty? We think they are not, and that they are not included, and were not intended to be included, under the word "citizens" in the Constitution, and can therefore claim none of the rights and privileges which that instrument provides for and secures to citizens of the United States.
The passage concludes that the people described are not citizens and therefore cannot claim constitutional rights. But it gives no independent support for its key premise that they were not included in the Constitution’s meaning of “citizens”; it simply asserts that premise. This is begging the claim, because the argument relies on the very point it needs to establish.
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