Events Leading to The Civil War

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Events Leading to The Civil War
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Four Factors of Division

• Economic Interests
• Westward Expansion
• Slavery
• Debates over the nature of the Union

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Slavery and States Rights

• Trying to work out issues led to a series of
  crises and compromises
• Admission of new states crisis
• Would it be admitted as free or slave state?
• Failure to settle these differences will lead to
  Civil War

4
United States Divided Economically

• The Northern states became increasingly
  industrial - based on manufacturing. They favored
  high protective tariffs to protect Northern
  manufacturers from foreign competition.

However, these tariffs are so high, that
Americans cannot, for the most part, afford to
buy foreign, imported goods.
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United States Divided Economically

• The Southern - agricultural economy based on
  farming and slave labor on plantations in the
  lowlands along the Atlantic and in the Deep
  South, and small subsistence farmers in the
  foothills and valleys of the Appalachian
  Mountains.
• The South strongly opposed high protective
  tariffs, which raised the price of imported
  manufactured goods.

These divisions so great that by 1830, many began
to identify more with their region or state than
the nation as a whole.
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Balance of PowerEscalation of Tensions

• 30 years before the Civil War
• Crises often related to the number of Free
  versus Slave states because of balance of power
  this would give in Congress between the North and
  South
• As we move West, becomes more of a crisis
• Abolitionist movement grows in the North after
  1830

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Slavery and States Rights

• The abolitionist (wanted to end slavery) movement
  grew in the North, led by William Lloyd Garrison,
  editor of The Liberator, an antislavery
  newspaper, and many New England religious
  leaders, who saw slavery as a violation of
  Christian principles.

Garrison declared, "I am in earnest - I will not
equivocate - I will not excuse - I will not
retreat a single inch - AND I WILL BE HEARD."
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The Abolitionist Movement

• Harriet Beecher Stowe, wife of a New England
  clergyman, wrote Uncle Toms Cabin, which showed
  the cruelties of slavery
• Best-selling novel that caused many Northerners
  to join the anti-slavery cause.
• Abolitionists received a positive response in the
  North
• Southerners were frightened by the growing
  strength of the
• abolitionist movement and
• threat of slave rebellions

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The Underground Railroad

• Network of roads and safe houses used to bring
  fugitive slaves out of the South and into the
  North.
• Harriet Tubman was famous for her work with the
  Underground Railroad.

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Gabriels Rebellion and Nat Turners Rebellion
(Virginia)

• 1800 - Gabriel Prosser
• Virginia Slave
• Planned Rebellion in Richmond, Virginia
• Prosser and 34 other slaves killed after their
  plot was uncovered

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Nat Turners Rebellion 1831
Turner, a slave in Southampton County, Virginia,
claiming divine inspiration, armed recruits with
axes and clubs and traveled through the county,
killing 55 whites in his attempt to lead Virginia
slaves into freedom. Slave owners in Virginia
crushed Nat Turners Rebellion, killing Turner
and more than 100 of his slave-recruits. The
largest and bloodiest slave revolt in the South
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Effects of Rebellions

• Increased white southerners fears of slave
  rebellions
• Southern state legislatures pass stricter slave
  codes (the laws that governed lives of
  African-American slaves)
• After rebellions, those
• Southerners who did
• harbor anti-slavery
• feelings became silent

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Missouri Compromise
North and South argued about whether new states
would allow slavery Admission of states could
change the balance of power in Congress

• Henry Clay proposed the Missouri Compromise
  (1820)
• Missouri admitted as slave state, Maine as free
  state - Equal at 12 free, 12 slave states
  Senate Equal
• Drew an east-west line through the Louisiana
  Territory at 36 30 with states north of the
  line free and south of the line, slave, except
  that slavery was allowed in Missouri, north of
  the line.

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So.

• After the Missouri Compromise, it was important
  for Congress to keep number of slave and free
  states even
• As long as this was true, US Senate remained
  evenly divided between slave South and free
  North.

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But then, theres California

• 1849, the Gold Rush occurs in California when
  gold is discovered
• Thousands move to California
• California asks to be admitted to the union as a
  free state.
• Threatens balance between free and slave states.
  Again.

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Henry Clay The Great Compromiser

• Proposed
• Compromise of 1850
• Missouri Compromise
• 1833 Tariff Compromise

• California to become a state. Congress almost
  rejected California's constitution in 1850.
  Southerners argued that the Missouri Compromise
  of 1820 should be extended to divide California
  in half. They would have allowed slavery in the
  southern region. But the southerners finally
  agreed to admit California as a part of a deal
  worked out by Senators Henry Clay and Daniel
  Webster.

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Four Part Deal Compromise of 1850

• California entered as a free state
• New Mexico and Utah territories created with
  popular sovereignty provision
• Abolished the slave trade, but not slavery itself
  in Washington, DC
• Stricter Fugitive Slave law

Popular sovereignty Under this provision, each
territory would decide if they would allow
slavery in their territory Tougher fugitive
slave laws easier for owners and slave catchers
to capture and return fugitive slaves
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Fugitive Slave Law

• Northerners HATED the new, tougher Fugitive Slave
  Law
• It returned runaway slaves from the free North to
  the slave South
• It pitted Southern slave owners against outraged
  Northerners who held opposite views of the
  fugitive slave law

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Kansas-Nebraska Bill

• Bill Proposed by Senator Stephen Douglas
• Became a Law/Act when passed in 1854
• Did 3 Things
• Created two territories Kansas and Nebraska
• Said popular sovereignty would decide the issue
  of slavery in these territories
• Repealed (do away with) the Missouri Compromise
  because both were NORTH of the line

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Kansas-Nebraska Act

• Northern abolitionists felt this betrayed the
  Missouri Compromises promise of no slavery north
  of the line
• This law produced bloody fighting broke out in
  Kansas between pro-slavery and anti-slavery
  forces battled each other.
• Referred to as Bleeding Kansas
• It also led to the birth of the modern Republican
  Party to oppose the spread of slavery into the
  Western Territories.

The Kansas turmoil led to open warfare after John
Brown sought revenge for the "sack of Lawrence"
by murdering five pro-slavery settlers in cold
blood at Pottawatomie Creek in May, 1856. In
retaliation against Brown's raid, the proslavery
forces killed five free-soilers.
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Dred Scott v. Sanford

• Supreme Court rules Missouri Compromise
  unconstitutional
• Enraged Northerners overturns all previous
  efforts to limit slavery in western territories

Dred Scott, shown with Harriet Scott, his wife,
brought suit against Scott's former owner who had
taken him from Missouri into the Wisconsin
Territory where slavery was prohibited. Taney's
Supreme Court held that slaves such as Dred Scott
were not citizens despite the fact that such a
ruling meant he had no status to sue, Taney then
proceeded to argue that the Missouri Compromise
was unconstitutional because it restricted the
property rights of slave owners.
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Slavery and States Rights

• Hatred in the North of the Fugitive Slave Act
  (part of Compromise of 1850)
• Act states Slaves who escaped to Northern states
  should be forcibly returned to their owners in
  the South.
• This and the Norths opposition to the spread of
  slavery frightened Southerners

A handbill dated April 24, 1851, warning the
"Colored People" of Boston to beware of
infringement of their freedoms by the fugitive
slave law.
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Southern Belief - States Rights

• Southerners argued that individual states could
  nullify laws passed by the Congress.

John C. Calhoun had put forth the idea of
Nullification in 1832 in response to the Tariff
of Abominations
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States Rights

• They also began to insist that states had entered
  the Union freely and could leave (secede)
  freely if they chose. (Secede means to withdraw
  from or leave the Union)

Senator Daniel Webster responded in the Senate
that Calhoun's theory of nullification would
destroy the Union, saying "Liberty and Union, now
and forever, one and inseparable. Webster and
Clay worked out the Compromise of 1850.
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Slavery and States Rights

• Lincoln warned, A house divided against itself
  cannot stand. The nation could not continue
  half-free, half-slave. The issue must be
  resolved.
• Abraham Lincoln, who had joined the new
  Republican Party, and Stephen Douglas, a Northern
  Democrat, conducted numerous debates when running
  for the U.S. Senate in Illinois in 1858. Lincoln
  opposed the spread of slavery into new states
  Douglas stood for popular sovereignty. Lincoln
  lost the election, but set the stage for
  Presidential election of 1860

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Election of 1860

• Northerners supported Lincoln
• Southern vote was split between two candidates
  Stephen Douglas and John Breckenridge
• Lincoln won the election
• South Carolina seceded from the Union