crisis of union: the 1850s

Crisis of Union: The 1850s

Events from the decade leading up to the American Civil War (1861-1865)

The Missouri Compromise, 1820–1821

Railroad Growth, 1850–1860

Gadsden Purchase, 1853

Geographical Expansion and Population Growth, 1850

The Compromise of 1850

Compromise of 1850• Admit California as a free state• Divide Mexican Cession into Utah and New

Mexico - allow settlers to decide on slavery via Popular Sovereignty

• Land in dispute between Texas-New Mexico given to new territories = Fed Gov assumed $10 million Texas debt

• Ban slave trade in D.C. (Whites still own slaves• Adopt new, rigorously enforced Fugitive Slave

Law

Fugitive Slave Law

• Track down runaway slaves

• Capture them

• Return them to southern owners

• Fugitive Slave Cases under Federal jurisdiction

• Obstruction of enforcement subject to heavy penalties.

Compromise of 1850

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The Antislavery Movement• The abolitionist movement, or the movement to end slavery, gained

support during the early 1800s.• The creation of the West African nation of Liberia offended most

African Americans, who wanted to remain in their homeland, the United States.

• William Lloyd Garrison and Frederick Douglass were important abolitionist figures. Garrison was a white Bostonian who favored an immediate end to slavery; Douglass was a former slave whose powerful speaking and writing drew many supporters to the abolitionist cause.

• The roles of women and the value of political action became divisive issues in the abolitionist movement.

• Many enslaved people escaped to freedom in the North by way of the Underground Railroad, a secret network of escape routes.

• Resistance to abolitionism was strong and sometimes violent. Many white Northerners and most white Southerners opposed abolitionism.

The Legal Status of Slavery, from the Revolution to the Civil War

Distribution of Slaves, 1790 and 1860

Uncle Tom’s Cabin, 1852 (p. 387)

(Chapter 14) Uncle Tom Poster

(Chapter 14) Uncle Tom PosterHarriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin

was first published during 1851-52 as a serial in an abolitonist newpaper, then in 1852 as a book that sold more than 300,000 copies in that year. Northerners, already angered by the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850, felt increasing hostility toward the South. Frequent stage adaptations spread Stowe's antislavery message among northern workers who were unlikely to read books. "So you're the little woman who wrote the book that made this great war," Abraham Lincoln reportedly said when he met Stowe.

In this theater poster a menacing overseer whips a helpless and aged Tom, seemingly for no reason as Tom has picked the cotton now spoiling in the dirt. With his sharp goatee and rakish dress, the overseer, probably meant to represent the novel's fictional Simon Legree, looks vaguely European.

Even in 1860, the vast majority of northerners viewed blacks as an inferior race and opposed the abolition of slavery. But Stowe's novel had persuaded many northerners that slaveholders were bullies and threats to the republic. This poster depicts a dramatic and dangerous contrast between unrestrained power and powerlessness. Recall that the major political parties, Democrat and Whig, had played for decades on the dangers of unrestrained power, on the evils of the Bank of the United States or the dictatorial Andrew Jackson ("King Andrew I"). By showing Simon Legree as a violent tyrant, the poster captures the longstanding American fear of too much power in the hands of one person.

1. What impact might this poster have on northerners who rejected abolitionism?

2. In what ways would it have spurred northern loathing of the white South?

3. How might it have encouraged northerners to think of slavery and slaveholders as threats not just to Uncle Tom but to the American republic itself?

The Kansas-Nebraska Act, 1854

Kansas and Nebraska, 1854

The Compromise of 1850 and the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854

Kansas-Nebraska Act (1854)

• In the Kansas-Nebraska Act, Senator Stephen Douglas of Illinois proposed that these two new territories decide for themselves whether to allow slavery.

• Douglas needed the territories organized b/c of his interests ($) in the transcontinental RR development

• Popular Sovereignty - introduced to win Southern Congressional votes

Kansas-Nebraska Act: 1854

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Bleeding Kansas

Bleeding Kansas

• “Bleeding Kansas” — – Under the Kansas-Nebraska Act, voters in these two

territories could decide for themselves whether to become free or slave states (POPULAR SOVEREIGNTY).

– Violence broke out between proslavery and antislavery forces sent by outside groups to Kansas, earning it the nickname “Bleeding Kansas.”

– John Brown (abolitionist) – “Border Ruffians” - Pro-slavery Missourians

John Brown

The Lecompton (KS) Constitution

• The Lecompton Constitution — In 1857, a small proslavery group in Lecompton, the proslavery capital of Kansas, wrote a constitution for Kansas as part of an effort to acquire statehood.

• Antislavery voters refused to vote on the proslavery constitution

• Kansas remained a territory where slavery was legal but not practiced.

Dred Scott v. Sandford (1857)

• The Dred Scott Decision — The Supreme Court’s 1857 Dred Scott v. Sandford ruling proved to be controversial. In the ruling:– the Court held that slaves were not citizens– that living in a free state did not make a former

slave free– that Congress had no power to ban slavery

anywhere.

The Lincoln-Douglas Debates (1858)• In 1858, Senator Stephen Douglas ran for reelection against a

relatively unknown Republican, Abraham Lincoln.• In a series of highly publicized debates, Lincoln and Douglas

debated the issue of slavery in the territories. Douglas supported popular sovereignty, while Lincoln believed that the majority should not deny rights to the minority.

• Lincoln did not support the extension of slavery to the territories, but he felt that the federal government did not have the power to prohibit slavery in the South.

• Douglas won the election, but Lincoln earned a reputation for eloquence and that moral commitment would come to serve him well.

Dred Scott and Lincoln-Douglas Debates

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The Freeport Doctrine

• Stephen Douglas response to Lincoln’s question about how to reconcile Dred Scott and popular sovereignty

• Douglas’ idea that slavery could not exist in a community if the local citizens did not pass and enforce slave codes for maintaining it.

• Angered Southern Democrats

Harper’s Ferry, Virginia, 1859

• John Brown’s Raid — – October 16, 1859, John Brown led a raid on a

federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry, Virginia. – Brown had hoped to seize the arsenal’s

weapons and give them to people. – Instead, the federal government intercepted his

raid and Brown was hanged. – Northerners saw Brown as a martyr– Southerners denounced him as a tool of the

abolitionists.

Harper’s Ferry, Virginia

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1850s Political Realignment (a mess)• During the early 1850s:

– Whig Party dissolved (split into northern and southern factions)– two new parties emerged:

• the Know-Nothings (American Party)• the Republican Party

• Many Northern Whigs abandoned their party, unhappy with the compromises it made on the issue of slavery.

• Know-Nothing Party, so called because of its roots in a secret society, was also called the American Party. – Know-Nothings supported nativism, a movement to ensure that native-

born Americans received better treatment than immigrants.• A new Republican Party was formed by antislavery Northerners who

dedicated themselves to stopping the “Slave Power,” or the South. Consisted of Northern Whigs and “Free-soilers”

• Democratic Party remained strongly in control in the South– Also had a northern wing of the Democratic Party– Also consisted of Southern Whigs

Evolution of Major Parties through 1860

Map 13.8 Political Realignment, 1848–1860 (p. 392)

Map 13.8 Political Realignment, 1848–1860 (p. 392)

Map 13.8 Political Realignment, 1848–1860 (p. 392)

Map 13.8 Political Realignment, 1848–1860 (p. 392)

Election of 1860

Presidential Election of 1860 (showing popular vote by county)

Election of 1860• The Election of 1860

– The election of 1860 made the lack of national political parties clearer.

– Partially with the help of the Border States (Delaware, Maryland, Kentucky, and Missouri), a Constitutional Union Party was formed in the South.

– Republican Abraham Lincoln won the election without winning a single Southern electoral vote.

A Nation Divided - Civil War• The Lower South Secedes —

– Southerners were outraged that a President could be elected without their votes.

– They felt that the government had passed completely out of their hands.

– Seven states of the Lower South, beginning with South Carolina, seceded, or left the Union.

– These states formed a new nation, calling themselves the Confederate States of America, or the Confederacy.

• The War Starts — – In the spring of 1861, Confederate forces attacked Fort Sumter in South

Carolina.

– By firing on federal property, the Confederacy had committed an act of open rebellion, forcing Lincoln to call for military volunteers to respond to the attack.

– Four more Southern states then seceded and joined the Confederacy.

Proposed Crittenden Compromise, 1860

Southern Opposition to Secession, 1860–1861