“Bleeding Kansas”1856 Kansas territorial elections

fraudulent, participation by 5,000 Missouri “Border Ruffians”; pro-slavery leg. “elected”

“Bleeding Kansas”Pro-slavery legislature meets eventually in

Lecompton, KS

Begins writing two

Kansas constitutions,

both pro-slavery,

for KS voters to decide

Anti-slavery leg. Meets

in Topeka, writes

competing constitution

“Bleeding Kansas”Election boycotted by free-soilers;

most openly pro-slavery constitution chosen

Border Ruffians “influence” voters

Accepted by Pres. Buchanan (after campaign promise not to do so)

Rejected by Congress; more “evidence” of abolitionist control of US government

The Birth of the Republican Party

1854, Michigan: Republican Party forms in opposition to Kansas-Nebraska Act

Groups comprising the new party:

“anti-Nebraska” Democrats

ex-Free Soilers

“Conscience Whigs” – Whigs opposed to expansion of slavery

Led by Lincoln, William Seward

1856 ElectionJames Buchanan (D)

John C. Fremont (R)

Millard Fillmore (A)

Issues:

“Bleeding Kansas”

slave expansion

nativism and the “Know-Nothings”

Violence in the Senate

Sen. Sumner of MA beaten by Rep. Brooks of SC; took four years to recover

The Dred Scott DecisionScott sues for freedom after living

in free territory for several yearsChief Justice Roger Taney rules

that blacks are not citizens, thus cannot sue in Court (“blacks have no rights a white man is bound to respect… It does not by any means follow, because he has all the rights and privileges of a citizen of a State, that he must be a citizen of the United States”.)

The Dred Scott Decision“In the opinion of the court, the legislation and

histories of the times, and the language used in the Declaration of Independence, show, that neither the class of persons who had been imported as slaves, nor their descendants, whether they had become free or not, were then acknowledged as a part of the people, nor intended to be included in the general words used in that memorable instrument.”

The Dred Scott Decision“…the Federal Government can exercise no

power over his person or property, beyond what that instrument confers, nor lawfully deny any right which it has reserved.”

The US government cannot restrict the movement of slaves or the ownership of slaves; States are allowed to restrict it within their borders (i.e. Missouri Compromise was unconstitutional)

The Panic of 1857Caused by overproduction in the North (leading

to unemployment) and inflation (caused by California gold)

South almost unaffected

Led to further defense of slavery & secession

The Lincoln-Douglas Debates

Seven debates for the Senate seat from Illinois; several hours in length

Lincoln now national figure

The Lincoln-Douglas Debates“I do not question Mr. Lincoln's conscientious belief that the negro was made his equal, and hence is his brother; but for my own part, I do not regard the negro as my equal, and positively deny that he is my brother or any kin to me whatever. I do not hold that because the negro is our inferior therefore he ought to be a slave. By no means can such a conclusion be drawn from what I have said. On the contrary, I hold that humanity and Christianity both require that the negro shall have and enjoy every right, every privilege, and every immunity consistent with the safety of the society in which he lives. On that point, I presume, there can be no diversity of opinion. You and I are bound to extend to our inferior and dependent beings every right, every privilege, every facility and immunity consistent with the public good.” Stephen Douglas

The Lincoln-Douglas Debates

“I have said a hundred times, and I have now no inclination to take it back, that I believe there is no right, and ought to be no inclination in the people of the free States to enter into the slave States, and interfere with the question of slavery at all. I do not wish to be misunderstood upon this subject of slavery in this country…I suppose it may long exist, and perhaps the best way for it to come to an end peaceably is for it to exist for a length of time. But I say that the spread and strengthening and perpetuation of it is an entirely different proposition. There we should in every way resist it as a wrong, treating it as a wrong, with the fixed idea that it must and will come to an end.”

Abraham Lincoln

Harper’s Ferry (Oct.,1859)Brown takes over a federal

arsenal in Harper’s Ferry, VA

Planned to arm slaves to create a slave rebellion in Virginia

Funded by abolitionists in the North (“the Secret Six”)

Harper’s Ferry (Oct.,1859)Brown captured and wounded by Virginia

militia (led by Robert E. Lee)

Found guilty of treason and hanged

A Depiction of the Hanging of John Brown

Impact of Harper’s FerryJohn Brown becomes a martyr for abolitionism;

praised by many Northerners

Secession gains momentum

Secessionist leaders of South Carolina

Election of 1860Lincoln campaigns against expansion of slavery,

not abolition; South threatens secession

Images of the 1860 election

Election of 1860Lincoln wins with

lowest % of popular vote in history

Not even on ballot in ten states

Impact of Lincoln’s ElectionSouth Carolina secedes (Dec, 1860)

Southern militias begin training

Lincoln tells South they cannot secede without war

The Secession of the South

“In your hands, my dissatisfied fellow countrymen, and not in mine, is the momentous issue of civil war. The government will not assail you. You can have no conflict without being yourselves the aggressors. You have no oath registered in Heaven to destroy the government, while I shall have the most solemn one to "preserve, protect, and defend it…."

I am loath to close. We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained, it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battle-field, and patriot grave, to every living heart and hearth-stone, all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.”

Lincoln’s First Inaugural Address