What do you think the white people are doing? What are the African Americans doing? How would a southerner feel about this? What do you see here? Why would a southerner feel that this violated the Compromise of 1850?

Why would this new law upset northerners? Why does this act violate the Missouri Compromise? What area will now be open to slavery if people vote for the act?

The Fugitive Slave Law No one was happy with the Fugitive Slave Law passed under the Compromise of 1850. Under the law, any person arrested as a runaway slave had almost no legal rights. In addition, any person who helped a slave escape, or refused to aid slave catchers, could be jailed. Many northerners refused to support the law, angering slaveholders and making the law impossible to enforce. Of the tens of thousands of fugitives living in the North during the 1850s, only 299 were captured and returned to their owners.

they were asked to help slave catchers. northerners refused to obey it.

Uncle Tom’s Cabin In 1851, Harriet Beecher Stowe, a northerner, apparently had a vision while she was sitting in church. Her vision was of a saintly slave known as Uncle Tom who was whipped to death by his cruel master, Simon Legree.

Uncle Tom’s Cabin Stowe raced home and wrote down her vision. It would later become part of a much longer story that was first published in installments (parts) in an abolitionist newspaper.

In 1852, Uncle Tom’s Cabin was published as a novel. It was soon turned into a play as well. It aroused powerful emotions about slavery and in the North, it turned millions of people against slavery. Meanwhile, in the South, the novel and its author were scorned and cursed.

it aroused powerful emotions against slavery. it turned people against slavery.

The Ostend Manifesto It was a message sent to the secretary of state by three American diplomats who were meeting in Ostend, Belgium. President Franklin Pierce had been trying to purchase the island of Cuba from Spain, but Spain had refused the offer. The message from the diplomats urged the U.S. government to seize Cuba by force if necessary. When the message leaked to the public, angry northerners charged Pierce’s government of wanting to grab Cuba in order to add another slave state to the Union.

The Kansas-Nebraska Act Senator Stephen A. Douglas of Illinois drafted a bill to create two new territories on the Great Plains, Kansas and Nebraska. Under the bill, the Missouri Compromise would be scrapped and it would be left to the settlers themselves to vote on whether to permit slavery in the two territories. Northerners feared that it would lead to more slave states, but Douglas told them that the climates of Kansas and Nebraska were not suited for slavery.

Bloodshed in Kansas After the Kansas-Nebraska Act was passed, settlers poured into Kansas. Most of these settlers were peaceful farmers, but some moved to Kansas either to support or to oppose slavery. Before long, Kansas had two competing governments, one for slavery and one against it.

Bloodshed in Kansas The struggle over slavery turned violent when pro-slavery settlers from Missouri invaded Lawrence, Kansas, the home of the anti-slavery government. The invaders burned a hotel, looted several homes, and tossed the presses of two abolitionist newspapers into the Kaw River. Two days later, an abolitionist named John Brown and seven of his followers invaded the pro-slavery town of Pottawatomie. They dragged five men they suspected of supporting slavery from their homes and hacked them to death with swords.

John Brown and the clash of pro-slavery and anti-slavery forces in Kansas

it overturned the Missouri Compromise and allowed slavery north of 36o30’ in the Louisiana Territory. they could take slaves into the Louisiana Territory.

Charles Sumner The violence in Kansas greatly upset Senator Charles Sumner of Massachusetts. In 1856, he gave a passionate speech entitled “The Crime Against Kansas,” where he accused Douglas of having plotted with southerners to make Kansas a slave state.

Violence in Congress One of the southerners Sumner attacked in his speech was Senator Andrew P. Butler of South Carolina. Two days after the Sumner’s speech, Senator Butler’s nephew, South Carolina representative Preston Brooks, attacked Sumner in the Senate, beating him with his cane until it broke in half.

Reactions to the Attack Reactions to the attack on Sumner showed how badly divided the country had become. Many southerners applauded Brooks for defending the honor of his family and the South. Southern supporters sent Brooks new canes to replace the one he had broken on Sumner’s head. Most northerners viewed the beating as another example of southern brutality.

In 1857, the slavery controversy shifted from Congress to the Supreme Court with a case concerning a Missouri slave named Dred Scott. Years earlier, Scott had traveled with his owner to Wisconsin, where slavery was banned by the Missouri Compromise. Upon his return to Missouri, Scott went to court to win his freedom, arguing that his stay in Wisconsin had made him a free man. The Dred Scott Case

The Dred Scott Case The nine Supreme Court justices had four key questions to decide: As a slave, was Dred Scott a citizen who had the right to bring a case before a federal court? Did his time in Wisconsin make him a free man? Did Congress have the power to make any laws at all concerning slavery in the territories? And, if so, was the Missouri Compromise a constitutional use of that power?

he had lived in a free territory. they felt slave owners should have the right to take their slaves anywhere.

Group Work You and your partner must both agree upon the compromise. Work with your partner to develop a compromise. In developing your compromise, find the best way to protect your side’s interests without escalating (increasing) the tensions. You and your partner must both agree upon the compromise. Once agreed upon, write down your compromise under Part 2 on pg. 148.

The Dred Scott Decision The Supreme Court decided by a vote of five to four that Scott could not sue for his freedom in a federal court because he was not a citizen. Nor could he become a citizen because no African American, whether slave or free, was an American citizen – or could ever become one.

The Dred Scott Decision The Supreme Court also rejected Scott’s argument that his stay in Wisconsin had made him a free man because the Missouri Compromise was unconstitutional. The argument of the Court was as follows: Slaves are property. The Fifth Amendment to the Constitution says that property cannot be taken from people without due process of law – that is, a proper court hearing. Banning slavery in a territory is the same as taking property away from slaveholders who would like to bring their slaves into that territory and that is unconstitutional.

Reactions to the Dred Scott Decision Southerners applauded the decision and hoped that the issue of slavery in the territories had been finally settled in their favor. Northerners were stunned and outraged by the Court’s decision.

- Dred Scott could not sue for his freedom in a federal court because he was not a citizen, nor could any African American ever become one. - Scott’s stay in Wisconsin did not make him a free man because the Missouri Compromise was unconstitutional. - Congress cannot ban slavery in the territories.