A. Reaction to the compromise of 1850
a. The opponents of slavery used the fugitive slave act as a rallying cry against the cruelty of slavery
b. Southerners became more militant in defense of their society
c. Both sides solidified their belief system – compromise became more difficult to imagine
d. Democrat Franklin Pierce was elected in 1852 in hopes that he could mend the country
e. The Whig party collapses as southern and northern members cannot agree on slavery and tariff issues
f. Southerners assert the sovereignty of individual states, northerners claim the nation is indivisible
B. Kansas – Nebraska bill
a. Senator Stephen Douglas introduced a bill to organize the Nebraska territory (he wants to be President)
i. He felt that popular sovereignty was the way to solve the slavery issue – people in new territories would choose to be free states, but the south would be appeased because the people of the territory did the deciding.
ii. Douglas sought to have Indian tribes removed from western regions
iii. Douglas wanted a transcontinental RR with Chicago as its eastern terminus
iv. Douglas needed southern support to get his bill passed, and he faced opposition from Jefferson Davis who wanted the transcontinental RR to go through the south
v. Senator Dixon of Kentucky proposes to repeal the Missouri Compromise – Douglas agrees, he still feels the territories would vote to be free states
vi. Northerners react against the repeal of the Missouri compromise, and oppose the Kansas – Nebraska bill
vii. Most people feel that Kansas will become free and Nebraska will be slave, thus maintaining the status quo
b. President Pierce urges the passage of the bill – it passes both houses
c. Democrats were beginning to split as the Whigs had, the party was becoming stronger in the south
d. The Republican party is started by a group of anti-Nebraska Whigs and Democrats in Jackson Michigan
i. The new party is made up solely of northerners and is anti-slavery
1. Some oppose slavery on moral grounds
2. Most oppose slavery because they want the west to be purely white
3. They tried to associate the Democratic party with slavery
e. Kansas becomes the test of popular sovereignty
i. Speculators move in hoping to make money selling to the next generation of settlers
ii. Missourians consider Kansas an extension of their state and want to keep it for expansion
iii. Free soilers figure that with popular sovereignty as the law, all they need to do is move a majority of abolitionists into the territory until the Constitution is written (1200 settlers are moved to Kansas by the Emigrant Aid society – an abolitionist group
iv. Most settlers came from neighboring states
v. Armed groups started “patrolling Kansas” – their goal was to scare free-soilers away
vi. Violence broke out in 1856 between the two groups – precursor of the civil war
f. Bleeding Kansas
i. John Brown, his sons, and a group of his followers attacked a pro-slavery group – murdering 5
ii. Missourians counterattacked – they killed one of Brown’s sons and burned the free town of Osawatomie
iii. Over the summer over 200 people were killed, and over $2 million in property was destroyed
iv. The violence was echoed in Congress – southerner Preston Brooks on the floor of the Senate caned Charles Sumner. Brooks was censured; he resigned, but then was reelected by a huge margin. Northerners kept Sumner’s seat vacant as a reminder of southern “arrogance”.
g. Election of 1856
i. The Republicans nominate John Fremont (Mexican American war hero) as their first presidential candidate. Many former Whigs and disenchanted Democrats joined the new party
1. Their platform criticized slavery, but was based mainly on the ideas of internal improvement of the country
ii. The Democrats dump Pierce and nominate James Buchanan (he was an author of the Onstead Manifesto)
iii. Buchanan wins with only 45% of the popular vote. (Fillmore ran as a Whig)
1. Fremont was not on the ballot in any of the southern states yet he could have won had he won two of the five northern states he lost
C. Dred Scott
a. Buchanan urged the country to allow the about to be released verdict in the Dred Scott decision to settle the slavery issue. He knew before he said this that the verdict favored the south.
b. Dred Scott had been taken to Wisconsin territory from Missouri and then back to Missouri – upon the death of his owner he sued in State court for his freedom on the grounds that he had lived in a free territory
c. He won and then lost in Missouri state court, he then appealed to the US Supreme Court
i. The Supreme Court looked at two questions
1. Did Scott have the right to bring his case into the federal courts? --Can a black person be a citizen of the United States?
2. Was the Missouri Compromise constitutional
ii. In a 235 page opinion of the 5-4 decision Chief Justice Taney declared that black people do not have the same rights as a whites
iii. Taney added that the Missouri Compromise was unconstitutional as it deprived people of their right to move property anywhere in the US
iv. Many northerner saw this decision from a predominately southern Supreme Court as an effort to extend slavery throughout the land.
D. Kansas statehood
a. President Buchanan sent Robert Walker to Kansas as Governor with orders to ratify a state constitution
b. The election of delegates was disputed by free-soilers (even though they probably would have won), and they boycott the convention
c. A proslavery document (Lecompton Constitution) was ratified, it also prohibited the movement of free blacks into the state
d. The Senate ratified the Constitution, but the House refused to allow the admission of Kansas under the Lecompton document
E. Economic Problems – slavery was not the only issue dividing the country
a. Panic of 1857 – Americans had borrowed to invest in speculative endeavors, in the 1857 several banks collapsed and called in debts owed to them. This bankrupted many of the investors.
b. The Crimean war ended and the world agriculture market was flooded with Russian goods
c. Northern merchants blame the lowering of tariffs for the depression – They join the Republican party
d. Workers blame southerners for increased unemployment and many become Republicans
F. Lincoln and Douglas compete for the Senate seat from Illinois in 1858
a. The two have a series of debates in Illinois over the issue of slavery and freedom
b. Lincoln states “a house divided amongst itself cannot stand” but loses the election
c. The Republican party look to Lincoln as its leader
G. John Brown moves his fight to Harper’s Ferry, Virginia. He and his force of 18 men attack the federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry. He may have been planning a slave uprising as well, but he was captured by Colonel Robert E. Lee.
a. He was executed on December 2, 1859, and immediately became a martyr to the cause of abolition
b. Southerners looked at the public outcry surrounding Brown’s death and said this is what Republican rule would look like.
H. Election of 1860
a. The Democratic party was split between support for Buchanan (south) and Douglas (north)
i. Jefferson Davis’ ideas that slavery must be protected in the Constitution is put into the Democratic party platform
ii. Douglas tried to change it to reflect his belief in popular sovereignty
iii. Douglas wins the debate, but southern Democrats withdraw from the convention and hold another one in Baltimore
b. The Republicans meet in Chicago, and nominate Abraham Lincoln. Lincoln said slavery should be contained to the south, but not made illegal
i. Republicans condemned John Brown, favored the Pacific Railroad bill, and favored an increase in the tariff
ii. Southern Democrats felt that this party was a threat to their way of life
c. The Constitutional Union party met in Baltimore
i. The former Whigs met and nominated John Bell of Tennessee in the hope of preventing secession
d. The Southern Democrats met in Baltimore and nominated John Breckinridge of Kentucky
i. They called for federal protection of slavery
ii. The south threatened to secede if Lincoln were elected – he represented everything that the south feared and loathed
iii. Republicans said that the southern Democrats were bluffing
e. The election was essentially 2 races Lincoln vs. Douglas in the north (Lincoln was on no southern ballots), and Bell vs. Breckinridge in the south
f. Lincoln received 40% of the popular vote but won in the Electoral College. (map p. 351)
I. Secession
a. The south still felt it was the heartland of the country, and felt that the Republicans had turned their own country against them.
b. An election was called on the matter of secession – it had a lower turnout than the Presidential election
c. South Carolina, Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, and Texas voted to leave the US
d. They met in Montgomery, Alabama and formed the Confederate States of America with a constitution based on the US constitution + protection of slavery.
e. President Buchanan (lame duck) refused to recognize secession, and looked for another compromise
i. Senator Crittenden offered a compromise similar to the Missouri compromise, with a constitutional amendment to protect slavery. The Republicans refused.
ii. Former President Tyler with the Virginia General Assembly invited representatives from all the states to a Peace conference. The lower southern sent no one.
f. Buchanan told the south they could not secede, but that he couldn’t do anything about them seceding.
J. Two new presidents
a. Jefferson Davis was elected President of the CSA in February 1861
b. Lincoln was inaugurated in March
c. The day after Lincoln’s inauguration, Major Anderson sent word that Fort Sumter South Carolina needed supplies or it would be forced to surrender
d. Neither side wanted to start the war, or be the first to use force
e. Lincoln told Governor Pickens of SC that he would send food and clothing to the fort, but no new troops or arms unless the fort were attacked
f. Davis told Anderson to leave, when he didn’t the fort was bombarded in a 30 hour attack
i. Ironically no one was killed in the first battle of the civil war (except for one union soldier whose weapon blew up as the union force was giving a salute to the lowering of the US flag>)