“As the mistress of slaves!” came back the accusing whisper.
In the office she found her father and the two others deeply engrossed in conversation, their looks anxious and gloomy, but their manner showing excitement.
“Come in, Rhoda,” said Dr. Ware, as she hesitated at the door, “and hear the bad news.”
“Bad news! Oh, father, what is it?”
“The Supreme Court has decided the Dred Scott case and the result is even worse than we have feared. Chief Justice Taney has dragged his official robes through slavery filth and given to the pro-slaveryites everything they want!”
“Oh, father—Horace! What does he say?”
“The decision is,” answered Hardaker, “that a slave cannot be a citizen—practically, that a nigger has no rights a white man is bound to respect—that Congress has no right to prohibit slavery in the territories, and that therefore the Missouri Compromise is unconstitutional and void.”
“It knocks the very breath out of the Republican party,” added Dr. Ware. “Its existence is based on the effort to get Congress to forbid slavery in the territories. So, now—where is it? Where are we?”
“We are done for, all of us,” said Kimball, in hopeless tones. “It has knocked the footing from under the whole anti-slavery fight. It binds us hand and foot, and it looks now as if we might as well stop fighting.”
“Oh, no, Mr. Kimball!” Rhoda exclaimed. “Don’t say that! We must keep on fighting as long as there’s one of us left!”