Suing for Freedom in Early St. Louis

Dred and Harriet Scott’s suit for freedom, which ended in the infamous 1857 Dred Scott Decision, began right here in St. Louis’s Old Courthouse. But the Scotts were only two of more than 300 people who sued to claim their freedom in early Missouri.  

Judge David C. Mason will lecture on the history of these suits and the efforts by the Freedom Suits Memorial Foundation to recover and preserve the stories of these courageous litigants.  

In addition to the lecture, a recent acquisition of political speeches by Abraham Lincoln and Stephen Douglas in response to the Dred Scott Decision, digital copies of the freedom suits, and related materials from the Julian Edison Department of Special Collections will be on display before and after the lecture. Attendees are also encouraged to visit the traveling exhibition, The Freedom Suits, on view in Olin Library. Refreshments will be served after the lecture.

Schedule of Events 

• 5:00 pm – 5:30 pm: Exhibition viewing and items on display 
• 5:30 pm – 6:30 pm: Lecture in Olin Library, Room 142 
• 6:30 pm – 7:00 pm: Refreshments in the Ginkgo Reading Room and additional viewing time 

Free and open to all, registration requested. 

Sponsored by the WashU & Slavery Project, Center for the Study of Race, Ethnicity, and Equity (CRE2), and WashU Libraries. 

Speaker Bio

David C. Mason is a judge in the 22^nd Judicial Circuit Court of Missouri. Prior to his appointment, Judge Mason served as an assistant attorney general, general counsel to the Missouri Department of Corrections and was in private practice. Judge Mason has been a teacher of trial advocacy for the National Institute For Trial Advocacy, The Yeshiva University Benjamin Cardozo School of Law and several bar associations. He also has served as an adjunct professor of law at the Washington University School of Law since 1989. Judge Mason spearheaded the effort to create a Freedom Suits Memorial honoring those who fought for their freedom in the courts, which was unveiled in the courtyard of the Civil Courts Building in 2022.