Slavery in American History and the Civil War

Flashcards about Slavery, the American Civil War, and Reconstruction Era

What is considered a significant starting point to slavery in America?

1619, when The White Lion brought 20 enslaved Africans ashore in Jamestown, Virginia.

What was the American Civil War a culmination of?

The struggle between advocates and opponents of slavery.

What does Antebellum America refer to?

The period before the American Civil War.

What does Postbellum America refer to?

The period after the American Civil War.

What was the Missouri Compromise (1820)?

A measure that allowed for the admission of Missouri as the 24th state (1821) and marked the beginning of the prolonged sectional conflict over the extension of slavery.

What were the two main issues that split the nation, causing a sectional divide between the Northern and Southern states?

The issue of slavery and the balance of power in the federal government.

What is Manifest Destiny?

The idea that the United States is destined to expand its dominion and spread democracy and capitalism across the entire North American continent; The belief that white Americans were divinely ordained to settle the entire continent.

Who were the Border Ruffians?

Pro-slavery raiders who crossed into the Kansas Territory from Missouri to help ensure the territory entered the US as a slave state.

What was the Lecompton Constitution?

A pro-slavery constitution drafted in Lecompton, Kansas, in 1857 that contained clauses protecting slaveholding and a bill of rights excluding free blacks.

What was the Dred Scott Decision?

The US Supreme Court’s ruling in March 1857 that having lived in a free state and territory did not entitle an enslaved person, Dred Scott, to his freedom.

What was Bleeding Kansas?

A violent guerrilla war between pro-slavery and antislavery forces in Kansas between roughly 1855 and 1859.

When did the Civil War in the United States begin?

1861, following decades of simmering tensions between northern and southern states over slavery, states’ rights, and westward expansion.

What was the Emancipation Proclamation?

An edict issued by Abraham Lincoln in 1863 that freed the slaves of the Confederate states in rebellion against the Union.

What were the three turning points of the Civil War?

Battles of Chancellorsville, Gettysburg, and Vicksburg

What were the main reasons for the Union’s victory in the Civil War?

Superior resources (including workforce), transportation, and industrial capacity, as well as the effective leadership of President Abraham Lincoln and the military strategies of General Ulysses S. Grant.

How did Republican leaders cement the Union victory after the American Civil War ended?

The Union victory was cemented by gaining the ratification of constitutional amendments to abolish slavery (Thirteenth Amendment) and to protect the legal equality of formerly enslaved persons (Fourteenth Amendment) and the voting rights of male ex-slaves (Fifteenth Amendment).

During the 1860 elections, who did Abraham Lincoln campaign against, and what issues did they address?

Abraham Lincoln had campaigned against Stephen Douglas, mostly in a series of debates that addressed popular sovereignty and slavery.

What acts were passed by congress to address the question of rights and how the Southern states would be governed?

Freedmen’s Bureau, Civil Rights Act of 1866, and several Reconstruction Acts.