Drifting Toward Disunion

Chapter 19

Abolitionists, although a minority in the North, mounted a highly visible campaign against slavery, adopting strategies of resistance ranging from fierce arguments against the institution and assistance in helping slaves escape to willingness to use violence to achieve their goals.

Curriculum Objective

Harriet Beecher Stowe—Uncle Tom’s Cabin, in response to the Fugitive Slave Laws of 1850It was very successful, popular, millions of

copiesShowed how evil slavery really wasInfluenced many soon to be soldiersPopular in Europe, helped convince gov’ts not

to help the SouthThe Impending Crisis—Hinton R. HelperTried to prove the non slave holding south

suffered the most from slavery

Stowe and Helper: Literary Incendiaries

-Popular sovereignty gone wrong-Northerners moved into the area to

throw the vote under the New England Emigrant Aid Company; over 2,000 people immigrated

-Only 10 slaves in Kansas in 1860 and 15 in Nebraska

-1855 it was time to elect the territorial legislature, proslavery border ruffians from Missouri crossed the border to vote

-The proslaveryites set up a government at Shawnee Mission

-Abolitionists set up a government in Topeka

-Proslaveryites burned Lawrence and started Bleeding Kansas

The North-South Contest for Kansas

-John Brown

-An avid abolitionist

-He led a group of men to Pottawatomie Creek and killed 5 proslaveryites

-Civil War erupted in Kansas in 1856 and lasted until 1865

-By 1857 they had enough people to apply for statehood, most were Freesoilers

-Lecompton Constitution

-The people could only vote for the state constitution with slavery or without, not against the constitution as a whole

-If they voted against slavery it protected those slave owners already in Kansas

-The Freesoilers boycotted the vote and the proslaveryites voted for slavery

-President Buchanan was for the Constitution but Stephen Douglas was completely against it, for true popular sovereignty

-Compromised, popular vote for the entire constitution, and the Freesoilers voted it down by a landslide

-Kansas stayed a territory until 1861

Kansas in Convulsion

-Charles Sumner a very out spoken abolitionist and one of the most disliked men in the Senate-Speech The Crime Against Kansas

-He condemned proslavery men in Kansas and insulted Senator Andrew Butler of South Carolina-Preston Brooks was a member of the House for S.C. and cousin to Butler

-Beat Sumner with his cane on the floor of the Senate

-Brooks resigned but was reelected and met with a deluge of canes

-Sumner was almost killed, had to go to Europe for treatment for over 3 years, was also reelected

-This gave the abolitionists a martyr and a target

Bully Brooks and His Bludgeon

-Democrats put up James Buchanan, a rich Pennsylvania lawyer who was gone during the Kansas fiasco

-Republicans put up John C. Fremont—the pathfinder of the west, had little political experience and few enemies

-Republicans were against the extension of slavery while the Demos were for popular sovereignty

-The Know Nothings (large nativist push in this election) and the dying Whigs endorsed Fillmore

-174-114-8 Buchanan, Fremont, Fillmore, no candidate with a majority

-Buchanan won because of fear the South would secede, North was still tied economically to the South, conservatism won with the help of the southern bullyism

“Old Buck” vs. “The Pathfinder”

-Dred Scott vs. Sanford 1857-Black slave sued for his

freedom because he lived in free territory

-Court ruled he was a slave not a citizen and couldn’t sue in federal courts-Slaves were property and could be taken into any territory

-The Missouri Compromise was unconstitutional; Congress didn’t have power to ban slavery in the territories

-Shocked the country, undid popular sovereignty, pushed to war

Dred Scott

-Not as economically bad as 1837 but it was worse psychologically

-Causes—California gold, inflation, Crimean War in Europe raised grain prices led to overproduction, speculation in land and RR,

-North was hardest hit, South was fine because cotton prices stayed high; was false proof to the South they were better off than the North and it helps push to war, South thinks they are stronger, more needed by Europe

-Creates two issues for the election of 1860: free land, and higher tariffs

The Financial Crash of 1857

-Lincoln vs. Stephen Douglas for Illinois Senate

-Very little schooling, self-educated, wrestler, story teller, married up into the Todd family of Kentucky, became a lawyer in Illinois, carried his papers in his hat

-Served in the Illinois legislature as a Whig, and one term in Congress from 1847-49, Spot Resolution

-Lincoln Douglas Debates-Seven debates from August to October 1858-Slavery was a main issue-Threw Lincoln into the national spotlight

-Douglas won the Senatorial election

Lincoln

-Scheme to invade the South and use the slaves as his army

-Attacked Harpers Ferry in 1859 but the slaves didn’t rise up to help him; Robert E. Lee captured him and his band

-Brown was convicted of treason and murder and executed giving the abolitionists a martyr

-The South saw him as the symbol of abolitionists which scared them

John Brown

-Most important election in US History-The Democrats failed to nominate a candidate, split,

North for Douglas, South for Breckinridge, Constitution Party for John Bell-Republicans put up Lincoln

-Platform was no extension of slavery, protective tariffs, Pacific RR, internal improvements, free homesteads-Lincoln won with 40% of the vote, 180-123-Douglas had 12 electoral votes but he campaigned for himself, unusual-Republicans had a president but didn’t control congress of the courts

Election of 1860

-December 1860 South Carolina was the first followed by 6 in 6 weeks, total of eleven seceded-Created the Confederate States of America with Jefferson Davis as President-West Point Graduate also Sec of War-Buchanan did nothing while the states left the Union-Crittenden Amendments

-Designed to appease the South, guarantee slavery south of 36 30

-Failed partially because Lincoln rejected it

Secession

-Secession was based on slavery, the underground RR, abolitionists, John Brown-Most in the South thought it would be unopposed-Held to a false belief in their savior—King Cotton-They entered the Union voluntarily why couldn’t they leave the same way?

Farewell to Union