Western Lands and the Coming of the Civil War

1. Western Lands and the Coming of the Civil War Making the Avoidable Seem Inevitable, 1848-1861

2. What to Do With Lands Acquired From Mexico As a Result of the Mexican War? Slave or Free? Who gets to decide?

3. 4 Basic Positions • Let Congress Decide • Wilmot Proviso (Keep it out) • Divide territory (Missouri compromise Precedent) • Territories belong to all the citizens of all the states • Popular Sovereignty • Let the Supreme Court decide

4. 1848 Election Lewis Cass—Democrat—Popular Sovereignty Zachary Taylor—Whig—divide territory/nationalism over sectional issue of slavery Free Soilers—Martin Van Buren—keep slavery out of the territories

5. Zachary Taylor

6. 1848 Election Results • Taylor Won • Van Burenites hurt Democrats in New York and Whigs in Ohio • Democrats continued with popular sovereignty.

7. 1848 Election Results

8. Gold Rush in California sped up process California Petitioned for Admission as a free state

9. Forging the Armistice of 1850 • Congress struggled to elect Speaker of House • Taylor hoped to admit California and New Mexico as states quickly without dealing w/ issue of slavery in Territories.

10. California admitted as a free state Remainder of Mexican Cession/no restrictions on slavery Little Texas U. S. assumes Tx’s debt No slave trade in D. C. Slavery in D. C. Stronger Fugitive Slave Law Congress can’t interfere with interstate slave trade Clay’s Omnibus Proposal

11. Henry Clay

12. Great Debates • Daniel Webster’s 7th of March Address • Calhoun’s Valedictory • Seward’s Higher Law Speech

13. Valedictory of Great Triumvirate

14. No Votes for Omnibus bill Death of Zachary Taylor/Millard Filmore played more constructive role. Stephen Douglas engineered passage of 5 bills containing essence of Omnibus No real compromise. Fruits of Armistice exacerbated rather than ameliorated sectional tension Making the Armistice

15. Stephen Douglas

16. Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 Furthered belief of Slavepower conspiracy Northern interposition/Personal Liberty Laws Mobs rescued alleged runaways Uncle Tom’s Cabin Made abstraction of slavery personal to Romantic reading public Fruits of Armistice

17. Harriet Beecher Stowe

18. Franklin Pierce Administration • Democratic Dark Horse and “Doughface” • Appointed Southerners to key posts; these folk appeared to pursue proslavery agenda • Ostend Manifesto

19. Franklin Pierce/1852 Election

20. Kansas Nebraska Act • Stephen Douglas wanted Kansas Organized • Needed Southern votes • Agreed to overturn Missouri Compromise • Popular Sovereignty seemed “democratic” • Weakened Democrats in North; “Appeal of the Independent Democrats” • Weakened Whigs in the South

21. Major Significance of KNA • Emergence of Republican Party • “Bleeding Kansas” • Difficult to Organize Territory without added burden of slavery • New England Emigrant Aid Society/Border Ruffians • Sack of Lawrence—May 1856 • Pottawatomie Creek Massacre—John Brown

22. John Brown

23. Impact of Bleeding Kansas • Confirmed image of Lawless Southern slaveholders in Northern Mind • Led to Sumner-Brooks Incident

24. Sumner—Brooks Incident

25. “Bleeding Sumner” • Southerners think Sumner got what he deserved • Northerners see Southerners as brutal barbarians • Transformation of Northern Politics (Rise of Republican Party)

26. Abraham Lincoln

27. Rise of Republican Party • American or Know Nothing Party was a dominant party in North and 2d to Democrats as National Party through May 1856 • Republicans ran 2d in 1856 Election—Bleeding Sumner made their anti-slavery message appealing • Research done by William E. Gienapp

28. 1856 Election • John Charles Fremont (Republican) crusaded against those “twin relics of barbarism—polygamy and slavery” • James Buchanan—Doughface—popular sovereignty and nonintervention.

29. 1856 Election Map

30. 1857: The Year Everything Went Wrong • Dred Scott v. Sandford • Panic of 1857 • Lecompton Constitution

31. Dred Scott

32. Lincoln-Douglas Debates • Douglas won, but L.’s version of Anti-slavery made him extremely popular • “In the right to eat the bread earned by the sweat of his brow, he is equal to me, to Judge Douglas, and to everyone else.”

33. John Brown’s Raid • A conspiracy to Arm Slaves in Rebellion • Many Northerners thought Brown “will make the gallows as glorious as the cross.” • Southerners especially fearful: “All northerners are abolitionists, and all abolitionists are John Browns.”

34. Charleston Convention divides Democrats/Federal Slave Code in Territories Northern Democrats nominate Douglas; Southern Democrats nominate Breckinridge Lincoln wins Republican nomination/no extension of slavery John Bell of Tennessee is Constitutional Unionist Candidate 1860 Presidential Election

35. 1860 Election Map • Lincoln—180 Electoral Votes • Douglas—12 elect. Votes • Breckinridge—72 Electoral votes • Bell—39 Electoral Votes

36. Secession of Lower South • South Carolina, followed by six other deep South states seceded before L. took office • Why? • Internal Subversion thesis.

37. Confederate States of America • Established in Montgomery, Ala. • Constitution based on U. S. Constitution • Jefferson Davis/Alexander Stephens • Emphasis on Right of Revolution and morality of slavery

38. Buchanan/Compromise • Buchanan took no provocative actions: Fort Pickens Truce and Fort Sumter standoff • Crittenden Compromise failed • House Committee of 33 proposed 13th amendment failed