Causes of the Civil War Vocab

popular sovereignty

(in the context of the slavery debate) Notion  that the sovereign people of a given territory should decide whether  to allow slavery. Seemingly a compromise, it was largely opposed by  Northern abolitionists who feared it would promote the spread of  slavery to the territories

Free Soil Party

Antislavery party in the 1848 and 1852  elections that opposed the extension of slavery into the territories,  arguing that the presence of slavery would limit opportunities for  free laborers.

Underground Railroad

Informal network of volunteers that helped  runaway slaves escape from the South and reach free-soil Canada.  Seeking to halt the flow of runaway slaves to the North, Southern  planters and congressmen pushed for a stronger fugitive slave law.  

Compromise of 1850

Admitted California as a free state, opened  New Mexico and Utah to popular sovereignty, ended the slave  trade (but not slavery itself) in Washington D.C., and introduced a  more stringent fugitive slave law. Widely opposed in both the North  and South, it did little to settle the escalating dispute over slavery

Fugitive Slave Law

Passed as part of the Compromise  of 1850, it set high penalties for anyone who aided escaped slaves  and compelled all law enforcement officers to participate in retrieving runaways. Strengthened the antislavery cause in the North

Clayton-Bulwer Treaty: 

Signed by Great Britain and the  United States, it provided that the two nations would jointly protect  the neutrality of Central America and that neither power would  seek to fortify or exclusively control any future isthmian waterway.  Later revoked by the Hay-Pauncefote Treaty of 1901, which gave the  United States control of the Panama Canal. 

Ostend Manifesto:

Secret Franklin Pierce administration  proposal to purchase or, that failing, to wrest militarily Cuba from  Spain. Once leaked, it was quickly abandoned due to vehement  opposition from the North

Kansas-Nebraska Act:

Proposed that the issue of slavery be  decided by popular sovereignty in the Kansas and Nebraska territories, thus revoking the 1820 Missouri Compromise. Introduced by  Stephen Douglass in an effort to bring Nebraska into the Union and  pave the way for a northern transcontinental railroad. 

*Impending Crisis of the South*

Antislavery tract,  written by white Southerner Hinton R. Helper, arguing that non slave holding whites actually suffered most in a slave economy. 

New England Emigrant Aid Company:

Organization  created to facilitate the migration of free laborers to Kansas in order to  prevent the establishment of slavery in the territory.

Lecompton Constitution: 

Proposed Kansas constitution,  whose ratification was unfairly rigged so as to guarantee slavery in  the territory. Initially ratified by proslavery forces, it was later voted  down when Congress required that the entire constitution be put  up for a vote

Bleeding Kansas:

Civil war in Kansas over the issue of  slavery in the territory, fought intermittently until 1861, when it  merged with the wider national Civil War.

*Dred Scott* v. *Sanford*: 

Supreme Court decision that  extended federal protection to slavery by ruling that Congress did  not have the power to prohibit slavery in any territory. Also declared  that slaves, as property, were not citizens of the United States.

Panic of 1857:

Financial crash brought on by gold-fueled inflation,  overspeculation, and excess grain production. Raised calls in the  North for higher tariffs and for free homesteads on western public  lands.

Lincoln-Douglas Debates: 

Series of debates between  Abraham Lincoln and Stephen Douglass during the U.S. Senate  race in Illinois. Douglass won the election but Lincoln gained  national prominence and emerged as the leading candidate for the  1860 Republican nomination

Freeport Doctrine:

Declared that since slavery could not  exist without laws to protect it, territorial legislatures, not the  Supreme Court, would have the final say on the slavery question.  First argued by Stephen Douglass in 1858 in response to Abraham  Lincoln’s “Freeport Question”.

Harpers Ferry: 

Federal arsenal in Virginia seized by abolitionist  John Brown in 1859. Though Brown was later captured and executed, his raid alarmed Southerners who believed that Northerners  shared in Brown’s extremism.

Constitutional Union Party: 

Formed by moderate Whigs and  Know-Nothings in an effort to elect a compromise candidate and  avert a sectional crisis

Confederate States of America:

Government established after seven Southern states seceded from the Union. Later  joined by four more states from the Upper South

Crittenden Amendments: 

Proposed in an attempt  to appease the South, the failed Constitutional amendments  would have given federal protection for slavery in all territories  south of 36°30’ where slavery was supported by popular sovereignty. 

*Uncle Tom’s Cabin*: 

Harriet Beecher Stowe’s widely read  novel that dramatized the horrors of slavery. It heightened Northern  support for abolition and escalated the sectional conflict

Know-Nothing Party:

Nativist political party, also known as  the American party, which emerged in response to an influx of  immigrants, particularly Irish Catholics.