The Nation Splits Apart

Essential Questions What caused the Civil War? Was the Civil War inevitable?

Expansion is the Root of Tension Political: each new territory would eventually become a state with voting congressmen Support or oppose slavery? Southern concern: disruption of slavery? Economic: each new territory represented a huge money-making opportunity Southerners need new land – cotton exhausts land

Missouri Compromise of 1820 1st big dispute of free state vs. slave state was over the Louisiana Purchase territories Admitted Missouri as a slave state and Maine as a free state All territories North of Missouri Compromise Line must be free

Conflict Over Status of Territories Free Soil Movement Supported the Wilmot Proviso, which would have outlawed slavery in territories acquired from Mexico Abolitionists vs. moderate Northerners goals Organized a pol. party No slavery in new territories, and advocated homesteads Southern Position Wanted slavery in the new territories and to extend the Missouri Compromise line Popular Sovereignty Compromise between Free Soilers and South Let settlers decide

Compromise of 1850 Proposed by Henry Clay Utah and New Mexico to decide slavery issue by pop. sovereignty North gets CA admitted as free state New law banning buying/selling of slaves in D.C. South Gets: Fugitive Slave Act: makes it a Federal Crime to help runaway slaves, allows for recapture

Kansas-Nebraska Act 1854 Douglas wanted a transcontinental railroad to pass through IL (rather than a Southern route) He proposed organizing LA territory into Kansas and Nebraska However, he realized the South will block the RR if Kansas and Nebraska are free states New Compromise: to get Southern support, the Kansas-Nebraska Act will void the Missouri Compromise and open up Kansas and Nebraska to popular sovereignty

Bleeding Kansas and John Brown Massacre Pro-slavery v. Free-Soilers Both sides brought in “settlers” to make sure the popular sovereignty vote went their way Voter fraud, widespread intimidation and violence John Brown and the Pottawatomie Massacre

Caning of Sumner He claimed that Butler was “the Don Quixote of slavery, having chosen a mistress…who though ugly to others, is always lovely to him, though polluted in the sight of the world, is chaste in his sight… the harlot slavery.”

Dred Scott Decision 1857 Brown sued for family’s freedom based on the fact that they had lived in states where slavery was illegal Supreme court ruled he was not a citizen, and could not bring a case to court More importantly, decision stated that federal gov’t did not have the right to deprive people of property (could not deprive slaveholders of slaves in new territories) Missouri Compromise was unconstitutional Aroused public outrage, deepened sectional divide

John Brown’s Raid Led a raid at Harper’s Ferry, a federal arsenal Plot was to arm slaves w/ guns from the arsenal He and six other co-conspirators are found guilty and hung Northerners condemn Brown’s use of violence, Southerners are not convinced

John Browns’ Raid

Abraham Lincoln Former Whig Member of the new Republican Party R. Party – coalition of anti-slavery whigs and democrats Moderate Republican: not anti-slavery, but against expansion of slavery “If slavery is not wrong, nothing is wrong.” Famous house divided speech “This gov’t cannot endure permanently half slave and half free.” Lincoln-Douglas debates for Senate

The Election of 1860 Democratic Party breaks up Republican Nomination of Lincoln Constitutional Union Party forms

The South Secedes After Lincoln’s election Dec. 20, 1860: “The union now subsisting between South Carolina and other states under the name of the ‘United States of America’ is hereby dissolved.” Next, Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Texas seceded The Confederate States of America Jefferson Davis is president (Senator from Mississippi) New Constitution protecting slavery