Transcript Road to Civil War

The Union in Peril
1848-1860
Conflict in the Territories
The defeat of the Wilmot Proviso left deep a
sectional schism
 It also left the Union without a solution to the issue
of slavery in the territories
 This left three competing ideas on resolution:
 The Free-Soilers
 The Southern View
 Popular Sovereignty
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The Three Positions
Free Soil Movement
 Northern Democrats and Whigs support Wilmot
 This would have NO BLACKS, free or slave in the Mexican Cession
 Favored this approach because they didn’t want to compete for jobs
 They also advocated free homesteads and internal improvements
The Southern View
 Most southerners felt any restriction of slavery was a violation of their
Constitutional rights
 Moderate Southerners saw the Missouri Compromise line as acceptable
Popular Sovereignty
 This was the idea that the residents of a particular territory would vote
on whether slavery was allowed
The Compromise of 1850
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The 1849 Gold Rush
created the desperate need
for law and order in the
West generally, and
California specifically
To admit California would
upset the slave/free
balance
The Compromise of 1850
Elmer’s glued this issue
Proposed by Henry Clay, it
was another band-aid on
the simmering slavery
issue
Admit California as a free
state
 Divide the remaining
Mexican Cession lands into
the New Mexico and Utah
Territories and allow popular
sovereignty
 Disputed land is given to the
new territories in return for
$10 million to Texas
 Slave trade is banned in D.C.
 A new, and stringent fugitive
slave law
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Slavery and the Rise of Tension
Fugitive Slave Law
 The new law called for vigorous
enforcement which enflamed
Northern sentiments
Underground Railroad
 This helped escaped slaves to
the North guided by the North
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Literature
 Uncle Tom’s Cabin was the
most influential novel of its day
and aroused the North
 The Impending Crisis of the
South was another anti-slavery
book that was banned in the
South
The Crisis Deepens
The Election of 1852
 The Whigs attempted to ignore the
slavery issue and were defeated by
Franklin Pierce, a Northern Democrat
who supported the Fugitive Slave Law
The Kansas-Nebraska Act
 Stephen Douglas introduced this as a
way to resolve the slave issue in the
Kansas and Nebraska Territories
 In effect if repealed the Compromise of
1820
New Political Parties
 The Know-Nothings (Nativists)
 The birth of the Republicans
Video Clip: America Divided
Extremists and Violence
Bleeding Kansas
 The Kansas-Nebraska Act set
the stage for a violent showdown
in the new territories
 Settlers form Missouri and FreeSoilers sponsoring the New
England Emigrant Aid Society
fueled tension and violence
 John Brown led his sons on a
raid on a pro-slavery farm
settlement and killed 5
The Caning of Sumner
 Charles Sumner of
Massachusetts was beaten by
Preston Brooks after
inflammatory remarks about the
South and a personal attack on
SC Senator Andrew Butler
Constitutional Issues
The Lecompton Constitution
 The proslavery legislature at
Lecompton, Kansas submitted a
proslavery Constitution that
would admit Kansas as a slave
state
 James Buchanan asked
Congress to accept the
Lecompton Constitution, but
Congress rejected it.
 The document was defeated the
next year in 1858 by the voters of
Kansas
Dred Scott v Sandford (1857)
 This decision made the free
state/slave state debate moot
 Congress did not have the power
to deprive people of property
without due process
The Road to Secession
John Brown’s Raid: Harper’s Ferry
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The assuredly crazy John Brown
led a raid on a Federal arsenal at
Harper’s Ferry, Virginia
The idea was to steal the
weapons and lead an armed
uprising of slaves
Southerners felt this exemplified
the feelings of Northerners in
general, although most
condemned the assuredly crazy
John Brown
Brown was captured and hanged
for his crimes, but was hailed as
a martyr by some in the North
Republican Party Platform in 1860
•Non-extension of slavery [for the Free-Soilers.]
•Protective tariff [for the No. Industrialists].
•No abridgment of rights for immigrants [a disappointment for
the “Know-Nothings”].
•Government aid to build a Pacific RR [for the Northwest].
•Internal improvements [for the West] at federal expense.
•Free homesteads for the public domain [for farmers].
The Election of 1860
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This was the final straw in the
division of the Union
Lincoln won the election
without a single electoral vote
from a Southern state
They knew that they would
never have a chance to pass
favorable legislation in a system
so dominated by the North
South Carolina was the first to
secede in 1860
Seven other states followed in
1861
The Election of 1860
A last-ditch effort
The Crittenden Compromise
 This called for a Constitutional amendment to be passed reestablishing the 36*30’ line from the Compromise of 1820
 This would put slavery outside the reach of the Supreme Courts
Dred Scott ruling
 Lincoln did not accept the Crittenden Compromise as he felt it
violated the Republican principal of anti-slvaery.
 This effort failed as many Southerners also thought they were
invoking the rights outlined in the Virginia and Kentucky
Resolutions
VIDEO CLIP: THE MEANING
OF THE CIVIL WAR