DRED SCOTT DEFENDERS

120 House Republicans Vote to Keep Statues of Confederates in Capitol

Two hundred eighty-five members of the House voted to remove the busts, which included the author of the notorious Dred Scott decision.

Over 100 Republican members of the House voted Tuesday to keep statues honoring defenders of the Confederacy. The statues may soon be gone, however, as 285 members of the House voted to remove them, including 67 Republicans; 120 opposed the measure in all. The busts include dozens of Confederate officials like Jefferson Davis as well as the author of the notorious Dred Scott decision, Supreme Court Chief Justice Roger B. Taney, who held that Black people were neither eligible nor entitled to U.S. citizenship. A similar measure passed in the House last year but foundered in the Senate, then controlled by Republicans. Whether the current version of the resolution will pass the Senate is unclear with Democrats’ thin majority.