Chapter 14 The Union in Peril

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Chapter 14The Union in Peril

• The American People, 6th ed.

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Slavery in the Territories
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The Wilmot Proviso

• Amendment added to a congressional appropriations
  bill prohibiting slavery for ever existing in any
  territories acquired from Mexico

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Popular Sovereignty

• The idea that individual territories applying for
  statehood should decide the issue of slavery for
  themselves.

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The Compromise of 1850

• California entered the Union as a free state
• Territorial governments were organized in New
  Mexico and Utah to apply the principle of popular
  sovereignty
• The slave trade was abolished in the District of
  Columbia
• A new Fugitive Slave Act of 1850

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Consequences of Compromise

• Political alignment along party lines grew
  stronger
• Previously unheard, Americans were now discussing
  ideals of higher law than the Constitution
  succession and disunion
• Abolitionists stepped up work on the Underground
  Railroad and several states prohibited elected
  officials and organizations from participation in
  slave hunting

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II. Political Disintegration
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The Kansas-Nebraska Act

• Stephen Douglas of the Whig party, introduced a
  bill organizing the Nebraska Territory (which
  included Kansas)
• Southerners opposed the organization of the
  territory unless slavery was permitted
• Douglas suggested the application of popular
  sovereignty to the issue as the entire territory
  fell north of the Missouri Compromise line
• Issue inflamed all sides of the slavery issue,
  dragging the country closer to war.

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Young America

• Americans dedicated to the ideals of a
  nationalistic vision that included slavery and
  was modeled upon the revolutions of the era in
  Europe
• Specifically interested in the expansion of
  America into the Latin American continent and the
  Caribbean

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The Know-Nothings

• Nativist political action party comprised mostly
  of former Whigs who were dedicated to staunching
  the tide of foreign immigrants to the United
  States
• If asked about their affiliation with the group,
  members were told to respond, I Know Nothing.

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Kansas and the Two Cultures
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Bleeding Kansas

• On the eve of the Civil War, militant
  abolitionist John Brown and a few followers crept
  into a pro slavery settlement outside of
  Lawrence, Kansas
• They dragged five men out of their homes and
  hacked them to death with swords
• This act led to a series of violence in the
  divided territory

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Polarization and the Road to War
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Sectional Splits in the Democratic Party

• Dred Scott v. Sanford Supreme Court decision
  regarding the claims of freedom of a slave that
  had been transported into a free state.
• The constitutional crisis in Kansas the
  pro-slavery Lecompton constitution was created
  without a mandate from majority of settlers of
  Kansas it led to an uncertain status for Kansas
  and divided the Democrats further

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• The Lincoln-Douglas debates in Illinois
  Lincolns persuasive debates regarding slavery
  drew away a substantial chunk of the Democratic
  party.
• John Browns Raids Still on the lose after the
  Kansas massacre, John Brown hope to provoke a
  general uprising of eastern slaves by attacking
  the federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry, Virginia.
  Brown was captured, tried, executed, and
  eventually became a martyr for the abolitionist/
  Unionist cause

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The Divided House Falls
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Secession

• On December 20, 1860, South Carolina seceded form
  the Union by February, six other Deep South
  states had followed her lead.
• A week later a delegation met in Montgomery,
  Alabama to create the Confederacy.
• On April 12, shelling of Fort Sumter signaled the
  start of the American Civil War.

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