Steps to the Civil War

1820-1860                                                         

Missouri Compromise

• 1820• 11 slave states and 11 free states• Missouri territory became eligible for statehood• Northern congressman would not support statehood for Missouri since it would be admitted as a slave state• Henry Clay proposed compromise-Missouri enter as slave slave state and Maine enter as a free state. Proposed no slavery north of 36, 30 extending into Louisiana Purchase.• Compromise accepted.

• Thomas Jefferson expressed his opinion on the Missouri Compromise in a letter to John Holms dated April 22, 1820. Jefferson writes that the Missouri question, "like a fire bell in the night, awakened and filled me with terror. I considered it at once as the knell of the Union." -- Library of Congress

Map of the United States in 1820

War with Mexico

• 1830- 20,000 Americans living in Texas; 2,000 slaves.

• American settlers did not obey Mexican laws

- abolish slavery, learn Spanish and convert to

Catholicism.

• 1836- Texans begin seeking independence from Mexico. Santa Anna crushed rebels at the Alamo

• Texans declare themselves a republic-want annexation to the U.S. President Tyler supports idea. Enlists Calhoun to help. Alienates northerners.

• 1844- annexation rejected

• 1845-President Polk pushed through admittance of Texas as a state.

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• Border question emerges in 1845. U.S. wants Rio Grande River. Mexico wants Nueces River-150 miles north of Rio Grande.• Polk sends Zachary Taylor with troops to the Rio Grande River and Slidell as negotiator to Mexico.• Slidell refused. Polk orders Taylor to advance, Mexicans attack.• No formal declaration of war by Polk• Easy victory for Americans. • Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo 1848 U.S. acquires more territory from Mexico- New Mexico, Utah, California and Arizona• Wilmot Proviso

Campaign Banner for James K. Polk

Hand Colored Lithograph of General Taylor’s Encampment By Daniel Whiting 1847

Composed and arranged at the request of General Taylor

Ornamental Map of theUnited States1848

Untitled Cartoon- 1847

Propaganda Pamphlet 1848

Expansion of Slavery?

• Two compromises to resolve issue of slavery in territories

• Extend Missouri Compromise to Pacific. South supports and North rejects.

• Popular Sovereignty-Lewis Cass. Allow states to choose themselves whether they are free or slave.

Henry Clay, “The Great Compromiser”, introducing the Compromise of 1850 in the Senate Chambers

Compromise of 1850

• 1849 80,000 Americans moved to California territory-mostly men in search of gold.

• President Taylor suggests California be admitted as state using popular sovereignty.

• California chose to be free-protect chances for gold.

• Union was a stake

Henry Clay proposed a compromise1. California be admitted as a free state2. The southwest (Utah and N. Mexico territories) be

organized into states. Southerners would be free to bring slaves.3. Lands around Texas would go to the New Mexico

territory4. Slave trade abolished in Washington D.C. (not

slavery itself)5. A more effective Fugitive Slave Law- to be

enforced in the North.

Stephen Douglas(D-Ill) pushed it through by calling for provisions to be voted on separately.

Map of Territorial Expansion in 1850

Kansas-Nebraska Act 1854

• January 1854- Stephen Douglas proposed bill to organize land west of Missouri into Nebraska territory.

• To win over southerners Douglas proposed dividing region into Kansas and Nebraska and allow for popular sovereignty to be used to determine slavery in these territories

• Bill passed creating a split in the Democratic party- Know Nothings and Republicans emerge.

“Bleeding Kansas”

• North and South both want control of Kansas

• Both regions sent outsiders to Kansas to influence the vote on slave state status.

• November 1854-Missourians cross over state line and vote to sway vote toward pro-slavery.

• 1855- Pro-slavery legislature is elected in Kansas.

• Anti-slavery settlers refuse to accept this legislature-hold own elections.

• 1856-two governments in Kansas

• May 1856-pro-slavery group attacks an anti-slavery town.

• John Brown responds with attack on pro-slavery settlement-murders 5 men.

• By end of 1856- 200 men had been killed in Kansas

Portrait of John Brown

Attack of Charles Sumner (MA) by Preston Brooks on floor of Congress.Excerpt of speech by Charles Sumner

Sir, speaking in an age of light, and in a land of constitutional liberty, where the safeguards of elections are justly placed among the highest triumphs of civilization, I fearlessly assert

that the wrongs of much-abused Sicily, thus memorable in history, were small by the side of the wrongs of Kansas, where the very shrines of popular institutions, more sacred than any heathen altar, have been desecrated; where the ballot box, more precious than any work, in ivory or marble, from the cunning hand of art, has been plundered; and where the cry "I am an American citizen" has been interposed in vain against outrage of every kind, even upon

life itself. Are you against sacrilege? I present it for your execration. Are you against robbery? I hold it up to your scorn. Are you for the protection of American citizens? I show

you how their dearest rights have been cloven down, while a tyrannical usurpation has sought to install itself on their very necks.

                                                                        

Removal of Senator Charles Sumner

Dred Scott vs. Sanford 1857

• Dred Scott was a slave of a man who lived in Illinois, Wisconsin and Missouri

• Sued for freedom when owner died. Based case on having lived in free soil states

Dred Scott Decision

Supreme Court declared that blacks are not citizens therefore they cannot sue in federal court.

Declared the Missouri Compromise unconstitutional

Dred Scott not eligible to due process of law because he was living in territories

Decision threatened popular sovereignty and convinced many Northerners that the Supreme

Court was pro-slavery

                                                            

Map of the Election of 1860

Election of 1860

• 4 candidates for President 1. Douglas-Northern Democrat 2. Breckinridge-Southern Democrat 3. Bell- Constitutional Union 4. Lincoln-Republican

• Lincoln won the electoral college in the North and the West.• Lincoln was viewed by the south as an abolitionist.• Response of southern states to election was secession - South Carolina secedes from the Union in December 1860. Six other states follow in February of 1861.

Portrait of Abraham Lincoln