APUSH Unit 4.4-

It's called the antebellum era because the Latin phrase "ante bellum" literally means "before the war". Italics are for books and parentheses indicate that it falls under the same category/subject

John Tyler

• 10th president; Democrat at heart

• Disagreed with Whigs over economic programs - vetoed several Whig programs (American System)

• Whigs attempt to impeach him; first president to lose support from his political party

Manifest Destiny

• The belief that Americans were divinely destined to eventually expand all the way to the Pacific Ocean

• Claimed by John O. Sullivan

Texas Territory / Immigration

• Mexico gains independence from Spain & opens Texas to American settlers

• 1829: Mexico outlaws slavery and forces Americans to convert to Catholicism, Americans refused

• Americans ignored prohibition of slavery

Texas Revolt

• 1836 - American settlers led by Sam Houston revolts and declares Texas an independent republic (Lone Star Republic)

• Santa Anna leads troops into Texas, later defeated and forced to sign their declaration of independence

• Mexico doesn’t recognize it; annexation of Texas delayed & eventually leads to Mexican-American War

Oregon Trail

• More than 350k Americans traveled the Oregon Trail

• Americans hoped for annexation

• Reflected the belief of Manifest Destiny

Election of 1844

• Southerners want to Annex Texas

• Northerners were against annexation

• Henry Clay criticized the annexation of Texas; lost support

• Polk planned for the annexation of Texas; John C. Fremont to fortify NorCal

War with Mexico

• Mexico still claims Texas; disputes over Rio and Nueces River

• Democrats supported the war, they believed in Manifest Destiny

• Polk attempts to buy California & New Mexico from Mexico; they refuse an offer of $30 million

Wilmot Proviso

• 1846; a proposal aiming to ban slavery in territories acquired from Mexico

• Failed in the Senate, where Southern senators dominated

• North saw the rejection as a plot to extend slavery; South supported it

Treaty of Guadalupe-Hidalgo

• Mexico recognized the Rio Grande as the southern border of Texas; the United States paid $15 million and assumed responsibility for claims of American citizens on Mexico

• Northern Democrats & Whigs opposed the treaty since they saw it as an immoral expansion of slavery

• Some Southern Democrats disliked the treaty; they wanted the U.S to take all of Mexico

Free-Soil Party

• Opposed the spread of slavery into new territories; wanted land for white males instead of slaves

• Didn’t support abolition

1848 Election

• Zachary Taylor (Whig) vs Lewis Cass (Democrat)

• Lewis Cass ran on the idea of popular sovereignty; citizens can vote to keep slavery

• Cass lost popularity and Taylor won, becoming the 12th president

California Gold Rush

• 1849; “forty-niners'“ rush to California in search of gold

• California ratified a constitution which prohibited slavery; created sectional upset

• President Taylor supported this, even though he was a Southern slaveholder

Congressional Debate on Slavery in California

• Free Soil: didn’t want slavery to extend to new states

• Southerners: slaves are property and owners have a constitutional right to that property

• Popular sovereignty: voters in the state decide

• Abolitionists: didn’t want slavery lol

Compromise of 1850

Drafted by Henry Clay

• Admit California as a free state

• Divide the remainder of Mexico cession territory into Utah and New Mexico; allow popular sovereignty to determine slavery

• Give disputed land between Texas & New Mexico territory to new territories in return for federal government assuming Texas’ public debt of $10 million

• Ban slave trade in Washington D.C but allow slaveholding

• More fugitive slave law

Fugitive Slave Act

• Track down runaway slaves who escaped to the North and return them to the South

• African Americans were denied jury trials

• Persuaded Southerners to accept the loss of California to abolitionists and Free-Soilers

• Enforcement in North was bitterly and sometimes even resisted

Northern Resistance / Underground Railroad

• The Underground Railroad was a loose network of Northern free blacks and ex-slaves

• The North responded to the Fugitive Slave Act by passing liberty laws

Uncle Tom’s Cabin

• 1852; written by Harriet Beecher Stowe & documented harsh slave life

• Moved a generation of Northerners and Europeans to regard slave owners as cruel

• Southerners condemned the “untruths” in this book and saw it as the North’s prejudice against their way of life (slavery)

Franklin Pierce

• 14th President (1853-1857)

• Beat Winfield Scott, who was a Whig

Ostend Manifesto

• A secret plan to buy Cuba from Spain

• Wanted to make Cuba a slave state

• Northerners feared the South was trying to make a slave empire

Gadsden Purchase

• Secretary of War Jefferson Davis buys land from Mexico for transcontinental railroad

• Known as the Golden Purchase; acquired southern sections of New Mexico and Arizona

Kansas-Nebraska Act

• Key figure: Stephen A. Douglas; wanted to win approval from South to build transcontinental railroad

• Divide Northern Louisiana Territory into Kansas & Nebraska

• Popular sovereignty implemented by Douglas; voided Missouri Compromise

• Northern Democrats condemned this bill since it repealed the Missouri Compromise

Bleeding Kansas

• Douglas expected peace to settle in; Midwest antislavery farmers migrated to Kansas, transport paid by Free-Soilers and Northern abolitionists

• Proslavery Missourians crossed the border to create proslavery legislature; fighting broke out between the two

• John Brown led slaves and stole guns, persuading them to revolt, killing 5 settlers

Lecompton Constitution (Bleeding Kansas)

• Created by proslavery Missourians; tried to make their own legislature and their own state

Caning of Charles Sumner

• Massachusetts Senator Charles Sumner verbally attacked the Democratic administration

• His remarks bashed South Carolina Senator Andrew Butler; Butler’s nephew Preston Brooks beat Sumner with a cane

• Brook’s actions angered the North; South applauded his actions

Republican Party

• Composed of Free-Soilers, anti-slavery Whigs, and northern Democrats

• Wanted to stop the spread of slavery, not abolish it

• Democrats generally supported slavery

Election of 1856

• John C. Fremont (Republican) vs James Buchanan

• James Buchanan wins and becomes 15th president (1857-1861)

Dred Scott v. Sanford

• Dred Scott was a slave; him and his slaveowner live in the North (Wisconsin and Illinois)

• When Scott returns, he sues for his freedom which makes it to the Supreme Court

• Roger Taney ruled that African Americans are not citizens (you can’t sue in federal courts) & slaves are property

Dred Scott v. Sanford Impacts

• Overturned the Missouri Compromise and popular sovereignty

• Split the Democrats; Southern Democrats were happy but Northern Democrats saw this as an expansion of slavery

• Renews sectional tensions

Lincoln-Douglas Debate

• Lincoln (Republican) debates Douglas (Democrat) for a seat in the Illinois Senate in 1858

• 7 debates were held; Douglas championed popular sovereignty; Lincoln wasn’t an abolitionist but spoke on the moral issues of slavery

• Lincoln challenges Douglas to reconcile popular sovereignty with the Dred Scott decision

Freeport Doctrine / Views on the Doctrine

• Citizens in a territory can prevent the expansion of slavery by not passing laws that supported it

• Southern Democrats were outraged with Douglas’ response, they wanted his 100% support of slavery

John Brown’s Raid on Harper Ferry

• John Brown hoped to spark a slave revolt in 1859

• Attempts to seize the federal arsenal at Harper’s Ferry

• Doesn’t go well; charged with treason and hanged

Views of John Brown’s Raid on Harper Ferry

• South was angered; some felt that this confirmed the true intentions of the North

• Moderates in the North & Republican leaders condemned Brown’s use of violence

• John Brown was hailed as a martyr by antislavery Northerners & abolitionists