THE NATION BREAKING APART

Ch. 15

Growing Tensions Between North and

South

North and South Take Different Paths

Northern Economy– Based on Industry and

Commerce– Growth of Northern

Cities– Eastern and

Midwestern states develop strong ties

Southern Economy– Based on Plantation

System– Few wealthy planters

controlled Southern Society

– Planters relied on exports for profit

– South had little industry

Controversy over Territories

• California wants to come into US as a FREE state

• Would disrupt the balance of power between slave and free states in Congress

• Southerners wanted to divide the state into 2 halves

Compromise of 1850

• Proposed by Henry Clay

• 2 Main Terms…

Compromise of 1850

1. California admitted as FREE state• slave trade is abolished in Washington, D.C.

Pleases North

2. Congress would not pass laws regarding slavery for rest of territories won from Mexico

• pass stronger law to help slave owners recapture runaway slaves

Pleases South

Fugitive Slave Act

• Helped slave owners recapture runaway slaves

• People accused could be held without arrest warrant

• No right to jury trial• Required Northerners to

help recapture runaway slaves

• Sometimes free African Americans were captured

• Fines and jail for those who did not cooperate, helped slaves escape

www.todaysmeet.com/jefferson55

• Moral Choice….

Do I obey the law and support slavery,

Or

Do I break the law and oppose slavery?

WHY?????????

Uncle Tom’s Cabin

• Written by Harriet Beecher Stowe

• Portrayed the moral issues of slavery– Book centers on main

character’s life under three owners

Kansas-Nebraska Act (Notes)

Background info:

• Stephen Douglass drafted a bill to organize Nebraska territory into two territories – Nebraska and Kansas

• Suggested decision of slavery should be decided by Popular Sovereignty

Kansas-Nebraska Act

• Popular Sovereignty– System where the residents vote to decide an

issue (in this case they are voting on slavery)

– If passed, would get ride of Missouri Compromise by allowing people to vote for slavery where it had been banned

– Passed in Congress and became law

“Bleeding Kansas” (Notes)

• Fire-eaters: Those that were “Pro-slavery”

• Jayhawkers: Those that were “Anti-slavery”

“Bleeding Kansas”

• Proslavery and antislavery settlers flood into Kansas territory to vote on issue of slavery

• 5,000 Missourians came over and voted illegally• New Kansas legislature was now packed with

proslavery representatives• Antislavery settlers boycotted new government• Settlers on both sides get violent

“Bleeding Kansas”

• Proslavery mob attacks Lawrence, Kansas

• Abolitionist John Brown seeks to avenge the “Sack of Lawrence”

• Goes to cabins of proslavery neighbors and murders 5 people.

• Civil War breaks out in Kansas

“Bleeding Kansas”

Republican Party Forms

• Created by split of Whig Party– Northern: against the

K-N Act– Southern: for K-N Act

• Republicans gain strength in the North

Election of 1856

  John Fremont James Buchanan Millard Fillmore

       

Party Republican Democratic Know-Nothing

Stand on Slavery Against For Split

Election of 1856

• James Buchanan Wins!

The Case of Dred Scott

• Scott was a slave in Missouri

• Owner had taken him to live in territories where slavery was illegal

• Owner dies and Scott sues for his freedom

Dred Scott v. Sandford

• Case reaches Supreme Court• Said Dred Scott was a slave, not a citizen,

so he could not sue in U.S. courts• Also rules that Congress could not ban

slavery in the territories– This would violate slaveholders’ 5th

Amendment property rights

• Huge setback for abolitionist movement!!

Dred Scott v. Sandford

“The language of the Declaration of Independence is equally Conclusive: ...

We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal; that they are endowed

by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among them is life, liberty, and the pursuit

of happiness; that to secure these rights, Governments are instituted, deriving their just

powers from the consent of the governed. 

Dred Scott v. Sandford

The general words above quoted would seem to embrace the whole human

family, and if they were used in a similar instrument at this day would be so understood. But it is too clear for

dispute, that the enslaved African race were not intended to be included, and

formed no part of the people who framed and adopted this declaration…..

Dred Scott v. Sandford

…Yet the men who framed this declaration were great men -- high in literary acquirements -- high in their sense of honor, and incapable of asserting principles inconsistent with those on which they were acting. They perfectly understood the meaning of the language they used, and how it would be understood by others; and they knew that it would not in any part of the civilized world be supposed to embrace the negro race”

Lincoln-Douglass Debates

Lincoln

• Slavery was a moral, social, and political wrong.

Douglass

• Argued that popular sovereignty was the best way to address slavery

"A house divided against itself cannot stand." I believe this government cannot endure, permanently half slave and half free. I do not expect the Union to be dissolved-I do not expect the house to fall-but I do expect it will cease to be divided. It will become all one thing, or all the other.”

-Abraham Lincoln, Springfield, Illinois, June16, 1858

John Brown Attacks Harpers Ferry

• Brown wants to inspire slaves to fight for their freedom

• Planned to capture weapons arsenal at Harpers Ferry, Virginia

John Brown Attacks Harpers Ferry

• Kills 4 people in the raid

• Sends word to rally and arm local slaves

• But no slaves join the fight!!

• Brown and his men captured and executed

• Abolitionists tolled bells and fired guns in salute

“Bleeding Kansas”

Lincoln’s Election and Southern Secession

Ch. 15-4

Election of 1860

Southern States Secede

• Lincoln had said he would do nothing to abolish slavery

• Southerners did not trust him

• Saw Republican victory as a threat to the Southern way of life

• Warned if Lincoln won, the Southern states would secede, or withdrawal from the Union

Southern States Secede

• South Carolina secedes first

• Followed by Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, and Texas

• Formed the Confederate States of America

Jefferson Davis – President of the Confederacy

Efforts to Compromise Fail

• Efforts for Compromise fail• Lincoln assured South again he would not

abolish slavery• Lincoln stated he would not invade the

South, but he would not abandon the Union’s property there

• Would need to supply several forts in the South, including Fort Sumter, S. Carolina…

Critical Thinking

States’ Rights – theory that states had the right to judge when the federal government had passed an unconstitutional law

• Do you think the Southern states seceded to protect slavery or states’ rights??

• Defend your answer