 In 1857, the Supreme Court handed down its decision, ruling not only that slaves were not automatically made free simply by entering a free state, but more controversially that no one of African ancestry was considered a U.S. citizen and therefore that African-Americans could not initiate legal action in any court, even when they clearly had what would otherwise be a valid claim.The decision calmed the skirmishes between Missouri and Kansas partisans, but its publicity enraged abolitionists nationwide and contributed to the vitriolic rhetoric that led to the Civil War.By 1860, Missouri's initial southern settlers had been supplanted with a more diversified non-slave-holding population, including former northerners, particularly German and Irish immigrants.