Coming of the Civil War

The American Civil War (1861-1865)

Economic and social differences between the North and the South. (Morrill Tariff)

States versus federal rights under the Constitution.The fight between Slave and Non-Slave State

Proponents.Growth of the Abolition Movement.The election of Abraham Lincoln

“The Civil War started because of uncompromising differences between slave and free states over the power of the national government to prohibit slavery in the territories…” James McPherson, author

Five Causes of the Civil War

John C. Calhoun, the most effective proponent of the constitutional theory of state nullification.

1820 – Missouri Compromise – Maine would enter as a free state and Missouri would be slave. Territories north of Missouri would remain free.

Temporarily settled dispute over westward expansion of slavery

Western Expansion of Slavery

Henry Clay (KY) “The Great

Compromiser” Missouri Compromise & Compromise of 1850

War with Mexico allowed the U.S. to expand even farther west. The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo added 525,000 square miles to U. S. territory, including all or parts of present-day Arizona, Nevada, California, Colorado,  New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming.

Mexico also gave up claims to Texas and recognized the Rio Grande River as America’s southern boundary. In return, the United States paid Mexico $15 million. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0GTBkfZGNno

Mexican-American War (1846-1848)

With new territories comes the repeated question of whether slavery should be allowed to spread. David Wilmot proposed “ neither slavery nor involuntary servitude shall ever exist” in the western territories.

The Wilmot Proviso passed in the House of Representatives, but was blocked from coming to a vote in the Senate.

John C. Calhoun of S. Carolina argued that property can be taken into new western territories – including slaves.

Wilmot Proviso (1846)

Popular sovereignty – each new territory would vote on whether to allow slavery. This concept would again open the door to the expansion of slavery.

Free Soil Party –believed that the spread of slavery should not be allowed on the “free soil of the western territories.” Some wanted to stop the spread of slavery. Many wanted lands left open to white farmers.

Taking sides…

1849 – gold is discovered in California. There were 15 free states and 15 slave states. If California enters as a free state, it would create a majority in the Senate. Fearful southerners begin to consider secession.

Compromises were used to try to hold the union together.

California would be a free state. There would be no restrictions on

slavery in the Mexican Cession. The slave trade in the District of

Columbia would be outlawed. Southerners were allowed greater

power in recovering escaped slaves.

Compromise of 1850

Fugitive Slave Act – slave owners could point out escaped slaves and have them returned. No proof of escape was needed. Federal marshals were required to help catch the slaves and they could require ordinary citizens to help.

Frederick Douglass – an escaped slave turned social reformer who made speeches against the new law; often featured in an abolitionist newspaper called The Liberator.

Abolitionist leader Frederick Douglass

Harriet Tubman – African-American abolitionist and Union spy during the Civil War who helped slaves escape using the network of antislavery activists and safe houses known as the Underground Railroad.

Levi Coffin –Quaker abolitionist and businessman deeply involved in the Underground Railroad in Ohio and Indiana. His home was often called "Grand Central Station of the Underground Railroad” because of the 3000+ slaves he helped escape to freedom.

Underground Railroad

Harriet Tubman

Harriet Beecher

Stowe – wrote Uncle

Tom’s Cabin to depict

the true, cruel face of

slavery. Its publication

in 1852 inflamed anti-

slavery sentiment in

the North.

When President

Lincoln met Stowe in

1862, he reportedly

said, “So this is the

little lady who made

this big war.”

Harriet Beecher Stowe

A debate about whether to have a northern or southern starting point for the Transcontinental Railroad led to argument over slavery in the new territories.

The act organized Nebraska as a territory and, to

win southern support, proposed another state inclined to support slavery--Kansas. The Act allowed each to decide the issue of slavery on the basis of “popular sovereignty.”

Part of the Missouri Compromise had to be repealed to allow for this.

Kansas-Nebraska Act (1854)

Transcontinental Railroad-completed 1869

Northerners rushed to Kansas to create an anti-slavery majority. People living along the Missouri border (border ruffians)rushed over to vote illegally for a pro-slavery legislature and to intimidate anti-slavery settlements.

Two governments in KS resulted: one anti-slavery, one pro-slavery.

Pro-slavery Border Ruffians clashed with Jayhawkers, guerilla bands supporting a free state. In 1856, the sacking of Lawrence sparked a guerrilla war in Kansas that lasted for months.

Bleeding Kansas

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k3IFMSqTokQ

In a later raid on Lawrence, KS, Confederate guerillas killed 200 people and damaged $2 million worth of property in the anti-slavery settlement .

Bleeding Kansas

Dred Scott v. Sandford (1857)

Supreme Court declared that slaves were not citizens of the United States and could not sue in Federal courts.

Declared that the Missouri Compromise was unconstitutional--that Congress did not have authority to prohibit slavery in the territories.

The Dred Scott decision was later overturned by 13th and 14th Amendments

Abolitionist John Brown made a radical plan to put an end to slavery in the South: organize and arm the slaves so they would revolt and gain their freedom.

In 1859, he tried to take over the federal weapons arsenal at Harpers Ferry. The attempt failed (17 died.)

Brown and four of his men were convicted of treason and hanged to death on December 2, 1859.

Despite the quick failure of Brown's planned slave revolt, he became a martyr for the abolitionists' cause. Although many in the North didn't agree with his violent actions, they did agree with his belief that slavery should be abolished.

His actions convinced many Southerner’s that abolitionists wanted slave-holders killed.

John Brown’s raid on Harper’s Ferry

Raid on Harper’s Ferry 1859 Polarizing a Nation

Freedom Fighter or Terrorist?

"I, John Brown, am now quite certain that the crimes of this guilty land will never be purged away but with Blood. I had, as I now think vainly, flattered myself that without very much bloodshed it might be done.”

-620,000 will perish in the coming Civil War.