Transcript The Way Out West

The Way Out West
Ch. 9 & 10
• Manifest DestinyDoctrine (1845), that the
expansion of white
Americans across the
continent was inevitable
and ordained by God.
• Population in 1800 = 5.3
million
• Population in 1850 =
more than 23 million
Crowded East
Manifest Destiny
• Manifest Destiny distinguished by its explicitly racial component.
• Caucasian Anglo-Saxon Americans (descendants of ancient
Germanic tribes) were considered the foremost race of the world.
• Doctrine served as a self serving justification for the expansion out
West.
Black Hawk War
•
•
•
•
4 month rebellion
Started in Illinois and spread to Wisconsin Territory.
Illinois militia slaughtered 200 Sauk and Fox people.
Sauk and Fox tribes were forcibly removed from their
land and placed west of the Mississippi.
Fort Laramie Treaty
•
The Cheyenne, Arapaho, Sioux, Crow, and other tribes joined U.S.
representatives in swearing “to maintain good faith and friendship in all their
mutual intercourse, and to make an effective and lasting peace.”
•
Treaty provided various Native American groups with control of the central
plains, a 400 mile wide swath of flat land east of the Rocky Mountain that
stretched the Arkansas Rover north to Canada.
•
Native Americans promise not to attack settlers and agreed to allow the
construction of government forts and roads.
•
In return, the Native Americans wanted the government to honor the
agreed-upon boundaries and to make yearly payments to the tribes.
• Claims clubs – groups of local settlers on the nineteenth century
frontier who banded together to prevent the price of the of their land
claims from being bid up by outsiders at public land auctions.
• Claim clubs were essentially designed to "do what politicians
refused to do: Make land available to needy settlers." Their general
purpose was to protect the first settlers to arrive on unclaimed lands,
particularly in their rights to speculate and cultivate.
• Commercialization of Agriculture
– New technology production
– Commercialization of agriculture contributed
to growth of eastern manufacturing
– West became a market for eastern factory
goods.
Frontier of the Plain Indians
• Oregon Trail – more than two thousand miles that carried
American settlers from the Midwest to the new settlements in
Oregon, Utah, and California.
• First large overlanders group left Missouri in 1842.
• Most overlanders were young farm families.
• 90,000 people attempted the trip; 5,000 people died.
• Covered about 15 miles a day.
• Total trip was about 2,000 miles.
The Donner Party
• Group of American pioneers (87 people in total)
that attempted to get to California in 1842.
• After splitting up from the rest of the group, the
Donner Party got snowed in around the Sierra
Nevada in the winter of 1846-1847.
• In an effort to survive, the pioneers had to make
a choice…become cannibals or die.
• In the end, seven people survived (2 men and 5
women), who finally reached the western side of
the mountains on January 18, 1847.
The Mormon Migration
•
Religious community that played a
major role in expanding out west.
•
Started in upstate New York in
1827
– Joseph Smith (prophet)
• Received a special message
from God in a book “written
upon golden plates” buried in
a hillside.
• Translated the Book of
Mormon; established the
Mormon Church.
• Church of Jesus Christ of
Latter-Day Saints in Fayette,
New York, in 1830.
• An anti-Mormon mob killed
Joseph Smith and his brother.
• New Mormon leader –
Brigham Young
• Stopped near Salt Lake City
• Mormons awarded plots of
land to each family according
to its size but established
common ownership of two
critical resources.
– Water
– Timberland
The Mexican Borderlands
• Spain divided the Southwest into four main
groups.
– Indians (full blooded Native Americans who
retained their own languages and customs)
– Mestizos (racially mixed; Spanish and Indian)
– Criollos, American born whites of Spanish
ancestry
– Spaniards
• Spanish wanted to Christianize and civilize
the Indians.
• Largest concentration (300,000) of Indians
was in California.
• The Paiutes in Owens Valley perfected a
system for irrigating wild grasses.
• The Yumans along the Colorado River
practiced full scale agriculture (maize,
wheat, beans, tobacco, and melons.
• The Pueblos (Arizona and New Mexico),
incorporated the Catholic God and rituals
into their polytheistic religion.
Other Mexican Borderland Tribes
• Navajos, Apaches, Comanches, and
Kiowas
• The Comanches were the most feared
tribe by all nomadic people.
Americanization of Texas
• Mexican government encouraged Americans to
settle in Texas by offering huge land grants in
return for promises to accept Mexican
citizenship, convert to Catholicism, and obey
authorities in Mexico City.
• Empresarios – agents who received a land
grant from the Spanish or Mexican government
in return for organizing settlements.
• Stephen F. Austin founded first American colony in
Texas.
• Many new settlers ignored Mexican Law, especially the
Emancipation Proclamation of 1829, which forbade
slavery in the Republic of Mexico.
• In 1830, Mexican government levied the first taxes on
the Americans, prohibiting the importation of slaves and
closed the international border to additional immigration.
• Tejanos – persons of Spanish or Mexican
decent born in Texas.
• Mexicans were viewed as mongrelized
race of black people.
• Americans viewed Catholicism as a
superstitious religion and ignored all legal
requirements to accept the Catholic faith.
• When General Santa Anna was elected
president of Mexico in 1833, he ended any
hope of Texas becoming an autonomous
state.
• Mexican troops and rebellious Texans
began to fight.
The Alamo
• Franciscan mission and fort at San Antonio,
Texas, that was the location of the 1836 siege
and massacre of Texans by Mexican troops.
• Army of four thousand annihilated the 187
defenders of the Alamo.
• A few weeks later at Goliad, another three
hundred Texans were killed after the agreed to
surrender.
• While trying to flee
General Santa Anna was
captured and forced to
sign a treaty recognizing
Texas as an independent
republic with a border on
the south and west of the
Rio Grande.
• However, the Mexican
Congress rejected the
treaty and the border
dispute continued.
The Push into California and the
Southwest
• Mexican rule in California was weak.
• Californios – Californians of Spanish descent
• Government initiated program of economic development
to help strengthen its control over the region.
• Centerpiece of Mexican program
– Secularization of millions
– Opening up landholdings of the Catholic Church to private
ownership
– Releasing the Indians from bondage
• Santa Fe Trail – 780
mile trail opened by American
merchants from Independence,
Missouri to Santa Fe, New
Mexico for trading purposes
following Mexico’s
liberalization of the formerly
restrictive trading policies of
Spain.
• American imports were paid by
gold, silver, and fur.
Politics, Expansion and War
• James K. Polk was now president and wanted to
expand the United States by adding California
and New Mexico.
• April 1846, war broke out between the United
States and Mexico.
• Mexican Cessation of 1848 – addition of half a
million sq. miles to the United States after
winning the war with Mexico in 1846.
The Mexican War
• Polk refused to budge on the American claim
that the Rio Grande was the border between
Mexico and Texas.
• Mexico claimed that the border was the Nueces
River, which was 100 miles north of the Rio
Grande.
• With the Rio Grande as the border Texas would
be more than double the size.
• Polk sought a war that would give United
States control of California.
• Mexico fought bravely, but could not
match American Military; they lacked
leadership, modern artillery, and navel
capacity to fight off American advances.
• Taos Revolt – Uprising of Pueblo Indians
in New Mexico that broke out in January
1847 over the imposition of American rule
during the Mexican War; the revolt was
crushed within a few weeks.
• Treaty of Guadalupe
Hidalgo (1848):
Mexico gave up claim
to Texas north of Rio
Grande, Alta
California, and New
Mexico. (present day Arizona,
Utah, and Nevada)
Politics of Sectionalism
• Slavery in the Territories
– Outright exclusion
– Extension of the Missouri Compromise line to
the Pacific
– Popular sovereignty (allow residents to make
their own decision).
– Protection of the property of slaveholders
(meaning their right to own slaves) even if a
few in the territory.
• Wilmot Proviso- Amendment
offered by Pennsylvania
Democrat David Wilmot in
1846, which stated “ as an
express and fundamental
condition to the acquisition of
any territory from the Republic
of Mexico.
• Neither slavery nor involuntary
servitude shall ever exist in
any of the said territory.
Election of 1848
•
Democratic Candidate Lewis Cass
argued that territorial residents
should decide slavery issue.
•
Popular sovereignty – solution for
slavery that territorial residents,
not Congress would decide on
slavery issue.
•
Whig nominee Zachary Taylor
remained silent on the slavery
issue.
•
Taylor’s election gave the country
first president who was from the
“Lower South.”
Compromise of 1850
• GOLD, GOLD, GOLD, was discovered in California!
• Four Thousand people rushed from the North (Forty
Niners), including free blacks and slaves to mine gold
fields.
• Compromise of 1850 – Four step compromise
which…
– Admit California a free state
– Allow residents of the New Mexico and Utah
territories to decide slavery issues themselves.
– End the slave trade in the District of Columbia.
– Pass a new fugitive slave law to enforce the
constitutional provision stating that a person “held to
Service or Labor in one state…escaping into
another…shall be delivered upon Claim of the party to
whom such Service or Labor may be due.”
• Fugitive Slave Act –
required authorities in the
north to assist Southern
slave catchers and return
runaway slaves to their
owners.
• Frederick Douglas
brought together the
National Black
Convention in Rochester,
NY IN 1853, where he
established a national
council.
Uncle Tom’s Cabin
• Anti-slave newspaper
• Became a book in 1852,
which sold 300,000
copies in its first year.
• Highlighted the hypocrisy
of white Northerners who
were quick to perceive
evil in the South, but were
too blind to discriminate
against blacks in the
North.
Political Realignment
• Franklin Pierce becomes president at the age of
48.
• Ostend Manifesto – Pierce’s administration
coveted Cuba
– Claimed that Cuba naturally belonged in a family of
states with the United States
– Public revelation of the manifesto produced criticism
and embarrassment for administration.
Kansas-Nebraska Act
• Law passed in 1854 creating
the Kansas and Nebraska
Territories but leaving the
issue of slavery open to the
residents, which disregarded
the agreement of the Missouri
Compromise.
• This made it look like
Nebraska was intended to be a
free territory, while Kansas
was intended for slavery.
Bleeding Kansas
• Kansas became the first battle ground between those
favoring the extension of slavery and those opposing it.
• In the spring of 1855, thousands of armed Missourians
called “border ruffians”, voted illegally in Kansa, helping
elect pro-slavery legislature.
• Furious anti-slavery settlers countered by holding a
convention in Topeka and drafting their own constitution
that excluded slavery.
• “Bleeding Kansas,” as newspapers
dubbed the territory; became the scene of
a territorial civil war between pro-slavery
and anti-slavery settlers.
• By the end of 1856, 200 people had died
in the fighting and two million dollars’
worth of property had been destryoed
• Know-Nothing Party – anti-immigrant party formed from
the wreckage of the Whig Party and some disaffected
Northern Democrats in 1854.
• Republican Party
– Formed in summer of 1854
– Formed from antislavery Conscience Whigs and Democrats
disgusted with Pierce’s administration.
– Supporters of reform
– Opposed slavery; anti Southern sectional party
Dred Scott Case
• Slave owned by an army surgeon based in
Missouri.
• He traveled with his master to Illinois and the
Wisconsin Territory before returning to Missouri.
• Upon his return, Scott sued his master’s widow
for freedom, stating that the laws of Illinois and
the Wisconsin Territory banned slavery.
• After countless
appeals, the Supreme
Court ruled that
slaves could not be
U.S. citizens and that
Congress had no
jurisdictions over
slavery in the
territories.
Lecompton Constitution
• Proslavery draft written in 1857 by Kansas territorial delegates who
were elected under questionable circumstances.
• Was rejected by two governors, supported by President Buchanan,
yet was defeated by Congress.
Panic of 1857
• Banking crisis that caused a credit crunch in the
North.
• It was less severe in the South, where high
cotton prices spurred a quick recovery.
• Republican advantage
• Democrats did nothing as unemployment rose,
starvation got worse and the number of
homeless increased.
Lincoln-Douglas Debate
•
Series of debates in 1858 during the Illinois senatorial campaign during which
Douglas and Lincoln staked out their differences in opinions on the slavery issue.
•
Freeport Doctrine – proclaimed by Steven Douglas during the Lincoln-Douglas
debate.
•
Slavery could possibly exist in a territory only if the people passed a law to protect it.
•
Without such a law, slavery could not exist and slaves could not enter that territory.
North v. South
• South
–
–
–
–
More violent
Values = courtesy, honor, courage
More inclined to military service
Iliteracy rate 3x greater than north
• North
– Overwhelming white population
– Free wage labor
– Factory/industry work
• Slavery accounted for most of the differences
between the North and the South.
• Investment in land and black slaves limited the
amount that cold be invested in manufacturing.
• Slavery contributed to the South’s material
tradition and attitude toward public education.
John Brown’s Raid
• New England abolitionist John Brown’s illfated attempt to free Virginia’s slaves with
a raid on the federal arsenal at Harper’s
Ferry, Virginia.
• Brown was wounded.
• His men were either killed or captured.
• Brown was tried by the state of Virginia for
treason and was sentences to be hanged.
Election of 1860
• Constitutional Union Party –
National party formed in 1860
(mostly former Whigs),
emphasizing allegiance to the
Union and strict enforcement
of all national legislation.
• Northern candidates – Lincoln
& S. Douglas
• Southern candidates –
Breckinridge & Bell
• Lincoln chose to say practically nothing
during the election.
• Lincoln became the sixteenth president.
• Four days after Lincoln won the presidency, South
Carolina legislature elected to secede from the Union.
• By February, South Carolina, Florida, Mississippi,
Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, and Texas left the Union.
• Confederate States of America – Nation proclaimed in
Montgomery, Alabama in February 1861, after the seven
states of the Lower South seceded from the Union.
• Lincoln did not take office officially until
March 4, 1861, therefore Buchanan had to
deal with the issues of the secession.
• Unfortunately, Buchanan failed to work
with Congress in order to find a solution.
• Buchanan figured by waiting the situation
out, the South would come to their senses.
• Lincoln was against the
secession of the South,
but vowed to keep federal
order in his inaugural
address.
• Fort Sumter located in
Charleston, SC was
where Lincoln attempted
to provision federal troops
in 1861, triggering hostile
response from on-shore
Confederate forces,
starting the Civil War.