Crumbling Union SOL 6 Chapters 9 & 10

A Growing Division between the North and South In the first half of the 19th century, the United States became divided economically. The Northern states developed an industrial economy based on manufacturing. They favored high protective tariffs to protect Northern manufacturers from foreign competition. (Protective tariffs are taxes on imports that are so high Americans cannot afford to buy foreign goods.)

In contrast, the Southern states developed an agricultural economy consisting of a slavery- based system of plantations in the lowlands along the Atlantic and in the Deep South, as well as small subsistence farmers in the foothills and valleys of the Appalachian Mountains. The South strongly opposed high tariffs, which made the price of imported manufactured goods much more expensive.

These economic divisions, which separated the North and the South, increasingly caused many Americans to identify more with the section of the country in which they lived than with their status as Americans. This development caused the nation to struggle to resolve sectional issues between the North and South, which produced a series of crises and compromises.

During the decades before the Civil War, these crises often took place over the admission of new states into the Union. The basic issue was always whether the number of “free states” and “slave states” would be balanced, thus affecting power in Congress. As the United States expanded westward, the conflict over slavery grew more bitter and threatened to tear the country apart. Slave StatesFree States

After 1830, the abolitionist movement grew in the North. Abolitionists were people who wanted to abolish (end) slavery immediately. One of the most important abolitionist leaders was William Lloyd Garrison, who was publisher of The Liberator, an antislavery newspaper he started in 1831 in Boston. Abolitionist Movement Grows in the North

Many New England religious leaders also became active in the abolitionist movement, because they saw slavery as a violation of Christian principles.

In 1852, Harriet Beecher Stowe, the wife of a New England clergyman, wrote Uncle Tom’s Cabin, a best-selling antislavery novel. Because Stowe’s novel emphasized the cruelties of slavery, Uncle Tom’s Cabin inflamed Northern abolitionist sentiment and attracted previously indifferent Northerners to the antislavery cause.

Slave Revolts in Virginia Southerners were frightened by the growing strength of Northern abolitionism. Southerners also feared the possibility of violent slave rebellions.

Two important slave conspiracies occurred in Virginia during the first half of the 19th century. In 1800, Gabriel Prosser, an African American slave, planned an insurrection (revolt) of more than 1,000 slaves in Richmond. The Virginia militia put down Gabriel’s Rebellion and executed 35 slaves, including Prosser

The most important slave revolt occurred in Southampton County. Nat Turner, another Virginia-born slave, had learned to read and write during childhood. As an adult, Turner became an electrifying preacher. In 1831, his anger at slavery’s injustices exploded. Turner armed slave recruits with axes and clubs and traveled throughout the county, killing whites whom they met. Before authorities put down Nat Turner’s Rebellion, 55 whites and more than 100 blacks had died

The slave revolts in Virginia, led by Gabriel Prosser and Nat Turner, stunned the South and fed white Southern fears about slave rebellions and led to harsh laws in the South against fugitive slaves, as well as stricter slave codes. Slave codes were the harsh laws that governed the lives of African American slaves. In such an emotional atmosphere, white Southerners who favored abolition were intimidated into silence.

Maintain the Balance of Power in Congress The admission of new states during the first half of the 19th century continually led to conflicts over whether new states would allow slavery and thereby become “slave states” or prohibit slavery and enter the Union as “free states.” The North and South struck numerous compromises to maintain the balance of power in Congress between free states and slave states

The Missouri Compromise (1820) In 1820, Henry Clay of Kentucky proposed the first major compromise, called the Missouri Compromise. The Missouri Compromise drew an east-west line through the Louisiana Purchase, with slavery prohibited above the line and allowed below it, except that slavery was allowed in Missouri, which was located north of the line.

Under the terms of the Missouri Compromise, Missouri entered the Union as a slave state, while Maine entered as a free state. This arrangement kept the number of slave states and free states equal at 12 each. Since the Constitution grants each state two U.S. senators, the Missouri Compromise kept the United States evenly divided, with 24 slave state senators and 24 free state senators.

The Compromise of 1850 Soon after the 1849 California gold rush, California applied for admission to the Union as a free state. California’s admission to the Union threatened the balance of power between slave states and free states in the U.S. Senate. It also disrupted sectional peace, which the Missouri Compromise had established 30 years before.

After much debate, Congress passed the Compromise of Henry Clay also proposed this compromise, which had several provisions (parts). In the Compromise of 1850, California entered the Union as a free state, while the new Southwestern territories (New Mexico and Utah) acquired from Mexico would decide on their own. Also as part of the Compromise of 1850, slave trade (but not slavery itself) was abolished in Washington, D.C., and Congress passed a stricter fugitive slave law, which made it easier for slave catchers to capture and return runaway slaves.

Because of Henry Clay’s role in both the Missouri Compromise and the Compromise of 1850, historians have called Clay the “Great Compromiser.”

The Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854 Hostility between the free North and slave South grew worse in 1854, when Illinois Democrat Stephen Douglas proposed the Kansas-Nebraska bill. (A bill is a proposed law; an act is a bill which Congress has passed and the president has signed into law.)

The Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854 repealed the Missouri Compromise line by giving people in Kansas and Nebraska (which were both located north of the Missouri Compromise line) the choice of whether to allow slavery in their states. This idea was called “popular sovereignty.” (Popular refers to the people. Sovereignty means rule. Therefore, popular sovereignty meant the people would vote to decide whether they wanted slavery in their territory or state.)

The Kansas-Nebraska Act had two major results. Abolitionists and most Northerners believed the Kansas-Nebraska Act betrayed the Missouri Compromise’s promise that all territory north of the Missouri Compromise line would be forever free. Consequently, the Kansas- Nebraska Act produced bloody fighting in Kansas as pro-slavery and anti-slavery forces battled each other. Americans soon referred to this territory as “Bleeding Kansas.”

The Kansas-Nebraska Act led to the birth of the modern Republican Party in 1854 specifically to oppose the spread of slavery into the western territories. Horace Greeley formed the Republic Party

The Dred Scott Decision and Fugitive Slave Act In 1857, the Supreme Court became involved in the growing sectional conflict by handing down its decision in the Dred Scott case. In the Dred Scott decision, the Supreme Court ruled the Missouri Compromise was unconstitutional The Dred Scott decision by the Supreme Court overturned efforts to limit the spread of slavery and outraged Northerners

Northerners also hated enforcement of the Fugitive Slave Act (passed as part of the Compromise of 1850), which required slaves who escaped to free states to be forcibly returned to their owners in the South.

The Lincoln-Douglas Debates In 1858, Abraham Lincoln, who had joined the Republican Party, ran for the United States Senate in Illinois against Democrat Stephen Douglas, who was seeking reelection.

During this campaign, Lincoln and Douglas conducted numerous debates. In these debates, Douglas stood for popular sovereignty, while Lincoln opposed the spread of slavery into new states. In one of the Lincoln-Douglas Debates, Lincoln warned, “A house divided against itself cannot stand.” By this statement, Lincoln suggested the nation could not continue half free, half slave; the issue of slavery must be resolved.

Although Douglas defeated Lincoln in 1858, Douglas made many Southerners angry by suggesting the in the Freeport Doctrine that there was a way for western settlers to prevent slavery in a territory.

A Country Divided The North’s increasing opposition to the spread of slavery frightened pro-slavery Southerners. Southerners argued that individual states could nullify the laws passed by Congress. (To nullify a law meant to void it or do away with it.) Southerners also began to insist that states had entered the Union freely and could leave (“secede”) freely if they chose.

Lincoln’s “House Divided” speech was prophetic. The historical stage was set for the Civil War to begin

Causes for the Division Sectional debate over tariffs, extension of slavery in the territories, and the nature of the Union (State’s rights) Northern abolitionist v. southern defenders of slavery U.S. Supreme Court decision of Dred Scott case Publication of Uncle Tom’s Cabin Ineffective presidential leadership in the 1850s History of failed compromises President Lincoln’s call for federal troops in 1861