Causes of the Civil War

1. Causes of the Civil War

2. #1 Missouri Compromise • First national dispute over slavery and the balance of free states to slave states (11) when Missouri asked to be admitted to the Union as a slave state. • Passed in 1820 and created by Speaker of the House, Henry Clay • Missouri is admitted as a slave state • Maine is admitted as a free state • Slavery is banned from Louisiana Territory north of the 36 degree latitude line (Missouri’s southern border)

3. #2 Compromise of 1850 • California is admitted to the Union as a free state • The Mexican Cession was divided into the territories of New Mexico and Utah. These territories would use popular sovereignty to decide on slave/free status • The slave trade in Washington, D.C. was abolished • Congress passed the Fugitive Slave Law • California asked to be admitted to the Union as a free state • Southerners, looking at the Missouri Compromise line, wanted California to be divided in half: half slave, half free • Henry Clay again, forms another compromise:

4. Fugitive Slave Law • People in the free states had to help capture and return fugitive slaves • Anyone caught helping a fugitive slave could be jailed or fined heavily

5. #3 Uncle Tom’s Cabin • In 1852, Harriet Beecher Stowe published the novel, Uncle Tom’s Cabin, which told of the sufferings of slaves and their desire for freedom in the North. • Although it was fiction, it was based upon real people and events • She spoke to slaves she met as part of Underground Railroad and Abolition Movement • Made observations of her Oberlin, Ohio community torn apart by the Fugitive Slave Law • It was a best-selling book in the North: • More copies than any book of it’s day (except the Bible) and set off an outcry against slavery. • Angry southerners attacked the book for being false (propaganda)

6. #4 Kansas – Nebraska Act • 1854- Proposed to build a transcontinental railroad (a railroad that ran across the country from the east to the west.) • Stephen Douglas, a senator from Illinois, wanted the railroad to go through Chicago and bring money to his home state. But there were problems: • Railroad would have to go through unorganized territories of the Great Plains • Creating two new U.S. territories which could become states was controversial • Both territories were above the Missouri Compromise line (3630’) and therefore could not be slave states. • Douglas won the support of the south by: • Getting rid of the Missouri Compromise • Instituting popularsovereignty in the new territories

8. Birth of the Republican Party • Northerners who were opposed to extending slavery into ANY new territories organized a new political party – Republican Party (the same one we have today) • One goal: Keep slavery out of the territories The party grew quickly, replacing 35 out of the 42 northern Democrats who had voted for the Kansas-Nebraska Act.

9. #5 Bleeding Kansas • There were more anti-slavery settlers in Kansas than pro-slavery, and Kansas was destined to be a free state, using popular sovereignty. • Election Day, pro-slavery Missourians crossed the border into Kansas and stuffed the ballot boxes. • Kansas became a slave state and Congress called for another election • Kansas had a re-election, and Kansas became a free state. • 1856, Kansas had two governments, because neither side recognized the legitimacy of the election results. May 1856, Lawrence Kansas was attacked by pro-slavery people, killing several and burning down homes and stores In retaliation, John Brown, an abolitionist, and his sons killed five pro-slavery settlers. Kansas became a war-zone, and hundreds of settlers died on both sides, until Kansas became a free state in 1861

10. # 6 Dred Scott • 1857 case came before the Supreme Court concerning a slave named Dred Scott whose master had taken him to live in Illinois (free state) and then the Minnesota Territory before returning to Missouri • Dred Scott claimed that living in a free territory made him a free man • The Supreme Court ruled 7 to 2 that Dred Scott was still a slave: • Dred Scott could not sue because he was not a citizen and had no rights • No person of African heritage had the right to sue, so no person of African heritage had the right to citizenship under the Constitution • Missouri Compromise was unconstitutional. Congress could not ban slavery in any part of the territories. Banning the right to own slaves in any territory violated people’s rights to own property.

11. Illinois Senator Stephen Douglas and candidate Abraham Lincoln are running for the U.S. Senate • Douglas and Lincoln agree to a series of debates: Lincoln asked “if the people don’t want slavery in the territory, then how could the Supreme Court rule that people can’t ban slavery in the territories?” Douglas responded “the people in the territories can make laws that were “unfriendly” towards slavery”, and he lost southern support (but still won the Senate seat in Illinois) # 7 Lincoln/Douglas Debates

12. #8 Attack on Harpers’ Ferry • John Brown, the abolitionist who led the retaliation raids in Kansas, wanted a slave rebellion that would completely destroy slavery: • October 16, 1859, Brown and 18 followers attacked the federal arsenal in Harpers Ferry, Virginia. • Brown wanted the arsenal as a supply station for leading a mass slave rebellion. • After 36 hours of fighting, John Brown was captured, tried and hanged. • Northerners praised Brown for his sacrificing of himself for the cause of abolition • Southerners were horrified: how they could even share the same government with people who thought he was a hero? • To many southerners, that was the final touch that made them want to secede from the union.

13. #9 Election of Lincoln -Lincoln won the presidency because he received the most electoral votes, and the essential votes of the populous north. -The south is outraged, and consider the election of the radical republican Abraham Lincoln as a threat to their way of life.

14. Confederate States of America On December 20, 1860, South Carolina seceded from the Union, followed closely in the next six weeks by: • Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana and Texas • established the Confederate States of America. Jefferson Davis became the president of the new nation and the country came closer and closer to war.