Dred Scott article from November 1993:

Picture this. It's 1832, and you're a slave sold for $500. Eleven years later when your master dies, you attempt to purchase your freedom from his widow, but she's not selling. Since the topic of slavery is a hotly debated issue, you get yourself some legal consel and argue in court that since you were a resident of Illinois and Minnesota for some time, you are a free man under the 1820 Missouri Compromise. You lose this case, but you are able to take the matter to the federal courts in 1853. However, in 1856, ten years after the original court case, the federal court ruled that since you are a black man of African descent, whose ancestors were brought and sold as slaves in this country, you have no right to sue in federal court. As a slave, no black man could claim citizenship of the United States and therefore, can not be protected under the Constitution. Thus ends the story of the 'original' Dred Scott.
However, in the 1990's, Tuff Break/A&M recording artist Jonathan 'Dred' Scott states "I think all black males are Dred Scott's to a certain extent whether they realize it or not, because they are still not really considered equal. There's still two different sets of rules that they be putting on us." To this day, men of African descent are still not fully protected by the constitution.
When he started rhyming back in the early 1980's, Jonathan Scott was looking for an original MC name, when he saw a black history special on the Dred Scott decision. At first he thought it would be a cool MC name, and then it started to became something that was a little deeper in meaning. "When they had slavery and when you were on the plantation, you had the master's last name. So maybe someone in my family was on the same plantation as (the original) Dred Scott."
The 90's Dred Scott is not really militant, just honest. He's an artist with a strong musical background and easy flowing skills that are evident on his first single with Tuff Break "Nutin' To Lose" b/w "Duck Ya Head".
Toast: Do the lyrics to "Nutin' To Lose" explain your opinion on the rap music business?
Dred Scott: Yeah. Everybody in this business is always tryin' to tell you 'You gotta rhyme about this' or 'You gotta sound like that'. It's almost like they're trying to make you a slave. With me, I'm gonna do what I'm gonna do, because it comes from the heart. Rap is the most changing music out there. It seems like every few months, someone drops a new flavor. There's so many flavors out there, you might as well just be yourself. So that's what I do.
Toast: Now on "Nutin' To Lose" you worked with Marley Marl on the remix.
Dred Scott: He did the remix, but I didn't work with him though. They sent the tapes to New York, and he just did it.
Toast: Just send the tapes and a check and he'll remix it?
Dred Scott: Yeah you know. I remember back in the days when he remixed that song "Release Yourself". I used to sit and listen to that remix over and over again. I used to be in this dance group and we used to battle against alot of different dance groups like the Pharcyde. Back then "Release Yourself" was the cut we used to dance to. I thought Marley was dope.
Toast: But you didn't get to work with him.
Dred Scott: Nah, but I'd just like to watch him in the studio, because I'm a student of hip-hop. When a lot of people were down on LL Cool J, Marley came to the rescue.
Toast: Yeah, Marley Marl gave LL's career mouth-to-mouth.
Dred Scott: Word up! I never would have thought that he would be doing my remix, but he did it up.
Toast: Any surprises on the upcoming album?
Dred Scott: Hopefully me, Tragedy, and the Alkaholics are going to do this cut together. I had done a show in Tijuana and I had met the Alkaholics there. We just hit it off. When I heard "Make Room", I was like 'Damn, I wish I could have made that record'.
Toast: When did you first get into rap music?
Dred Scott: When I look back, I had more fun when I was 12 or 13 years old, broke, standing on the corner rhyming with my boys. Everybody was doing it for fun. We all had dreams of having a record out, but it seemed unreachable.
I thought 'Damn, nobody will come out and take Whodini's or Run DMC's place'. Then in the late 80's came Big Daddy Kane, KRS-One, and Rakim. "Eric B. is President" sent shock waves throughout the hip hop world. Rakim was flippin' it with analogies. You could tell he sat down and thought about what he was sayin'. He was the first to make me rewind the tape to hear what he just said. And that's when I thought I could actually do this. They were the ones to make me get serious about rap and see it as an art form.
Toast: How did you hook-up with Tuff Break?
Dred Scott: I was at a club in LA called 'The Good Life' and you just go there and rhyme. It's a little, small, quaint place and you sit down and see people kick the rhymes. Almost like a poetry reading, except it's hip-hop. Pharcyde, Freestyle Fellowship, and Volume 10 came out of there.
I had been there like two years before and just got dissed. They booed. If you ain't coming correct, they will let you know. When I came back two years later, I wasn't even trying to get a record deal. I was coming back to get my respect, and sure enough Evan (Forster) and Tragedy happened to be there that night. Tragedy pointed me out to Evan. I owe a big shout out to Tragedy, because a lot of MC's wouldn't have done that. They don't want to see another come out due to competition.
Toast: You did a cut on the Deep Cover soundtrack, "I See ya Jay" as Ragtime.
Dred Scott: We ain't gonna talk about that. It was wack. I was still learning, and I knew at the time that it wasn't hittin'.
Toast: But through that you met Bilal Bashir?
Dred Scott: Yeah, Bilal is a pioneer of hip-hop on the west coast. He taught Muggs how to use an SP1200. When I first heard "Jump Around", that high pitched horn sounded familiar. It is the same horn that Bilal used in "Ain't Sayin' Nothin'" with Divine Styler which came out back in 1989. Same exact horn. Bilal is a pioneer of alot of the stuff that's going on. He's from the Bronx, and he broadened my whole world of hip-hop. A lot of people are caught in the Zapp and Gap Band mode. The funk is cool, but you've also got to have the creative edge too. That is what Bilal showed me. That was the turning point in me getting better.
(Article written by DJ Toast in November 1993. The article originally appeared in numerous national music magazines.)