Chapter 10

The Impending Crisis

The Slave Power

Conspiracy

The Wilmot Proviso

• What was the Wilmot Proviso?– An amendment to a military appropriations bill

in 1846 that stated that slavery would be banned in all land won from Mexico in the Mexican war … It did not pass.

• What did the Wilmot Proviso mean in practical terms?– If passed, CA, NM and Utah Territories would

be closed to slavery forever.

• What was the Northern position on the extension of slavery into the US territories? Why?– Northerners opposed the expansion of slavery

because it would strengthen the influence of slave states in the Senate.

• What was the Southern position on the extension of slavery into the US territories? Why?– Southerners favored the expansion of slavery

because it would strengthen the influence of slave states in the Senate.

The Compromise

of 1850

• What issue sparked the need for Compromise?–CA’s application to join the Union

as a free state

• Who shaped the Compromise of 1850?–Henry Clay

Stephen A. Douglas

• What terms of the Compromise appealed to the North?– CA admitted as a free state

• What terms of the Compromise appealed to the South?– A tougher Fugitive Slave Act is adopted

Other terms of the treaty:Popular sovereignty for NM and UtahTX gives up some land to NM for $10 millionThe sale of slaves is banned in Wash., D.C., but slavery remains

The Fugitive Slave Law

• What were the terms of the Fugitive Slave Act?– Alleged fugitives did not receive a jury trial and

could not testify on their own behalf; anyone convicted of helping fugitives was subject to $1,000 fine and 6 months in prison

• Who supported the act, and who opposed it?– South supported; North opposed

• How did northerners resist the act?– 9 northern states passed personal liberty laws,

which forbade the imprisonment of runaways and guaranteed them jury trials

Underground Railroad

• What was the Underground Railroad?–A network of free blacks and white

abolitionists who helped fugitive slaves escape to freedom

• Who was Harriet Tubman?–The most famous “conductor” on the

Underground Railroad; helped 300 slaves escape

Uncle Tom’s Cabin

• When was it written?– 1852

• Who wrote it?– Harriet Beecher Stowe

• What was the theme of the book?– Slavery was not just a political contest, but a

great moral struggle

• What were reactions to the book in the North? The South?– North: abolitionists increased protests against

the Fugitive Slave Act; South: criticized the book as an attack on the South as a whole

The Kansas-Nebraska Act

• Who introduced the Kansas-Nebraska Act to Congress?– Stephen A. Douglas (D – Illinois)

• What were his motives?– To get southern support for a railroad

from his hometown of Chicago to San Francisco

• What were the terms of the bill?– Divide unorganized western territories

into 2 territories (Kansas and Nebraska) and allow popular sovereignty to decide slavery issue

• Who supported the bill?–Southerners, b/c it repealed the

Missouri Compromise and opened new lands to slavery

• Who opposed the bill?–Northerners; b/c it extended slavery

further to the west

• When was the bill passed?–1854

Bleeding Kansas

• What led to “Bleeding Kansas”?– Passage of Kansas-Nebraska Act

• What happened in the 1855 election for a territorial legislature in Kansas?– antislavery and proslavery forces raced

to populate Kansas so they could elect an antislavery or proslavery legislature

• Who were the “border ruffians”?– The thousands of proslavery

Missourians who came into Kansas and voted illegally

• Was a proslavery or antislavery legislature elected?–Proslavery

• What did abolitionists do in response?–Claiming electoral fraud, they

organized their own antislavery legislature

The Sack of Lawrence

• Was Lawrence, Kansas, a proslavery or antislavery settlement?– Antislavery

• What caused the sack of Lawrence?– A proslavery grand jury condemned

Lawrence’s inhabitants as traitors and called on a local sheriff to arrest them

• What was the sack of Lawrence?– A proslavery posse of 800 burned buildings,

looted houses and stores in Lawrence

• What did this lead to?– The Pottawatomie Massacre

The Pottawatomie Massacre

• Who was John Brown?– A radical abolitionist

• What were his beliefs?– He believed that God had called on him

to fight slavery

• What did he do at Pottawatomie Creek? Why?– Brown and his followers murdered 5

proslavery settlers; Brown had the mistaken impression that 5 antislavery settlers had been killed during the sack of Lawrence

Violence in the Senate

• Who was Charles Sumner?– An antislavery senator from Massachusetts

• What was the nature of his speeches before the Senate on May 19th, 1856?– Entitled “The Crime Against Kansas”, he

verbally attacked other senators for their support of slavery

• Who was Andrew P. Butler?– Proslavery senator from South Carolina;

Sumner was especially abusive toward him in his speech

• Who was Preston S. Brooks?– A U.S. Congressmen and also Butler’s

nephew

• What did Brooks do to Sumner?– Approached him in the Senate chamber and

beat him repeatedly in the head with a cane

• How did southerners respond?– They applauded Brooks for what he had done

• How did northerners respond?– Condemned the incident as another example

of Southern brutality

The Whig Party Splits

• When had the Whig Party been founded? Why?– 1834; to oppose Andrew Jackson’s policies

• What issue divided the Whigs?– slavery

• What two factions emerged?– Northern Whigs (“conscience Whigs”) and

Southern Whigs (“cotton Whigs”)

• What was the fate of the Whigs?– It died out after the Kansas-Nebraska Act

(1854)

Nativism/Know-Nothing Party

• What is nativism?– The favoring of native-born Americans over

immigrants

• Who were the nativists and what were they afraid of?– Mostly middle class Protestants alarmed by

the large number of Catholic immigrants, who they feared would undermine democracy

• When did the nativists form their own political party?– 1854; The American Party

• What did this party soon come to be called?–The Know-Nothing Party

• How was this political party like the Whigs?–The Know-Nothings were also

divided over the slavery issue.

The Free-Soil Party

• What were two political parties that were forerunners to the Republican Party?– The Liberty Party and the Free-Soil

Party

• What were these parties’ political objectives?– Liberty Party = abolish slavery; Free-

Soil Party = stop spread of slavery to the west

• Who did the Free-Soil Party nominate for President in the 1848 election? What was the outcome?– Former President Martin Van Buren (D);

received no electoral votes but 10% of the popular vote

• How could a Northerner be a Free-Soiler without being an abolitionist?– Many Free-Soilers wanted land free in the

West so that free labor would not have to compete with slaves.

The Republican Party

• When was the Republican Party formed?– 1854

• What was the major purpose of the Republican Party?– Opposed the Kansas-Nebraska Act and the

extension of slavery into the territories

• What were some of the other groups that joined the Republican Party, increasing its political strength?– Abolitionists, Know-Nothings

The Election of 1856

• Who was the Republican candidate for President in the election of 1856?– John C. Fremont

• Who was the Democratic candidate?– James Buchanan

• What was the result of the election? Why?– Buchanan wins; he is the only truly national

candidate• What did the 1856 presidential election

prove?– Know-Nothings on the decline and

Republicans were on the rise

• Republican candidate: John C. Fremont

– The famed “pathfinder” who had mapped the Oregon Trail and led U.S. troops into California during the war with Mexico

• Know-Nothing candidate: Millard Fillmore

– Former U.S. president (Taylor’s VP)

• Democratic candidate: James Buchanan (PA)

– He was the only truly national candidate

• He was a northerner

• Most of his Washington friends were Southerners

• As minister to Great Britain, he had been out of the country during the heated disputes over the Kansas-Nebraska Act and thus he had antagonized neither the North nor the South

• Election results:– Buchanan won with 45% of the popular vote– But the Republicans came in a strong second

with 33%, demonstrating that they were a political force in the North

The Dred Scott Decision

• Who was Dred Scott?– A slave from Missouri

• Why did Dred Scott sue his owner?– He sued for his freedom b/c his owner had

taken him into a free territory

• What two basic legal questions did the Supreme Court have to decide?– Could a slave sue in court?– Does being in free territory make a slave

free?

• When did the Supreme Court hand down the Dred Scott ruling?– 1857

• Who was Chief Justice at the time?– Roger B. Taney

• What did the ruling say?– Slaves were not citizens and had no right to

sue.– Slaves were property. Any restriction on the

right to own property would violate the 5th Amendment

Dred Scott

• What did the Supreme Court, in effect, declare unconstitutional?– The Missouri Compromise

• What were the implications of the Court ruling?– The path had been cleared for the

extension of slavery into the western territories

The Lincoln-Douglas Debates

• Why were Abraham Lincoln and Stephen A. Douglas debating?– Both were competing for a US Senate seat

from Illinois in 1858

• What party did each man belong to?– Douglas (D); Lincoln (R)

• What was Douglas’ position on the extension of slavery into the territories?– He strongly believed in popular sovereignty

(let residents of territories decide for themselves if they want slavery or not)

• What was Lincoln’s position on the extension of slavery in the territories?– He was opposed to the extension of slavery

• What was the Freeport Doctrine?– Douglas’ answer to a question posed by

Lincoln: In light of the Dred Scott case, could residents of a territory exclude slavery? Douglas responded that they could, if they elected representatives that would not enforce slaveowners’ property rights.

Harpers Ferry

• What was located at Harper’s Ferry?–A federal arsenal

• Who led a raid on Harper’s Ferry?–John Brown

• What was his ultimate goal?–To seize weapons, arm the slaves,

and lead a slave revolt

• Who led US Marines to Harper’s Ferry to stop the raid?– Robert E. Lee

• What was John Brown’s ultimate fate?– He was captured, found guilty of

treason, and hung.

• How was this viewed by people in the North? The South?– North saw Brown as a martyr; South

saw him as a madman

Election of 1860

• Who did most people believe would be the Republican nominee for President in 1860?– William H. Seward

• Who actually won the Republican nomination? Why?– Abraham Lincoln; he was relatively

unknown and had not angered fellow Republicans … he was viewed as more moderate than Seward

• What other 3 parties ran candidates in the Election of 1860, and who were the candidates?– Northern Democrats = Stephen Douglas– Southern Democrats = John C. Breckinridge– Constitutional Union = John Bell

• Who won the election? Where did he draw his support from?– Lincoln; Northern states

• Who came is second? Where did he draw his support from?– Breckinridge; Southern states

Southern Secession

• Which state was the first to secede? Why did it secede?– South Carolina; they felt they had lost their

voice in national politics

• Which other states followed suite?– Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia,

Louisiana, Texas

• What did the secessionist states form on Feb., 4, 1861?– The Confederate States of America (CSA)

• Where was the Confederate capital?– Montgomery, AL

• How was the Confederate constitution different from the US Constitution?– The CSA constitution “protected and

recognized” slavery in new territories and stressed that each state was to be “sovereign and independent”

• Who was named President of the Confederate States of America?– Jefferson Davis

Confederate States of America (CSA)