History 12 Final Exam Term Review

Henry Clay “Package” of 1850 (Why Webster Supports)

• Background:

  • Clay was a Whig from Kentucky

  • Entered Senate in 1806

  • “The Great Compromiser”

  • Spoke with piece of Washington’s coffin in hand

• Proposed Compromise of 1850

  • Eight-point plan

    • California admitted as free state

    • In former Mexican territories, local inhabitants could institute slavery upon application for statehood.

      • In reality, no slavery.

    • Texas borders remain the same

    • Federal government assumes Texas’ debt

    • Slavery remains in DC

    • Slave trade banned in Washington DC

      • Optics

    • Tacit support for fugitive slave law

      • Desired stronger fugitive slave legislation

        • Bystanders “bound to assist”

• Congress non-interference in slavery

• Why did Webster support?

  • Webster desired Union, thought that Clay’s package would preserve.

    • Opened speech by saying that, “Mr. President, I wish to speak today, not as a Massachusetts man, nor as Northern man, but as an American.”

    • “The North is wrong, the South is right”

      • Webster was Massachusetts Senator

• Clay’s package was not passed, but eventually Stephen Douglass was able to pass by splitting the overall bill into individual ones.

  • Original bill only had four senators vote for it.

Salmon P. Chase’s “Appeal of Independent Democrats”

• Background:

  • Salmon P. Chase is Ohio Senator

  • January 19, 1854

• The Speech

  • Responding to the Kansas-Nebraska Act

    • Trying to settle whether slavery allowed in territories from Louisiana Purchase

      • Allowed for slavery to be determined by popular sovereignty in KS and Nebraska Territories

        • Stephen Douglas was lead advocate

    • Led to Bleeding Kansas

      • Influx of oppositional forces

  • Chase provides history on Missouri Compromise

  • Establishes Republican Party as Free Soil Party

    • Against the expansion of slavery into territories where it does not yet exist

Lincoln’s Preliminary / Final Proclamation of Emancipation

• Preliminary Proclamation:

  • Announced to cabinet on July 22, 1862

    • No deliberation, mind made up

    • Waited to deliver until military victory restored momentum

  • Invoked Second Confiscation Act

  • Federally funded, compensated emancipation

• Final Proclamation

  • Signed January 1, 1863

  • Applied to all regions where people “are this day in rebellion against the United States”

    • Loyal slaveholding states exempted and certain regions in New Orleans and surrounding parishes, West Virginia and Eastern shore counties of Virginia

  • No reference to colonization or to gradual, compensated emancipation

  • Also included new religious and moral language

  • Allowed for federal enlistment of black troops, including former slaves

    • Recruitment of slaves escaping former masters

  • Jubilee in response to hearing news

Lincoln on USCT

• Public letter on August 26, 1863 addressed to Illinois lawyer/politician James C. Conkling

  • Defending emancipation and enlistment of black troops

    • Referencing generals—including U.S. Grant—who heralded the efforts of black troops

    • Emancipation and black enlistment product of military necessity

  • Lincoln thinking about legacy of people’s involvement

    • Heralding contributions of black troops while criticizing Copperheads who disrupted the war effort

      • “There will be some black men who can remember that, with silent tongue, and clenched teeth, and steady eye, and well-poised bayonet, they have helped man kind on to this great consummation; while I fear, there will be some white ones, unable to forget that, with malignant heart, and deceitful speech, they have strove to hinder it.”

Clement Vallandigham

• Congressional representative from Ohio

  • Leading figure in the Copperhead (Peace Democrat) movement

    • Desired negotiated peace

    • Viewed Lincoln administration as tyrannical

      • Objected to perceived sacrifice of rights of white people for emancipation

  • Targeted by General Order 38 from Burnside that banned treason

    • Vallandigham tried to incite tension by delivering anti-war speech

  • Vallandigham was arrested and sentenced to prison

    • Lincoln released him and sent him to Confederate states

      • Vallandigham eventually left and went to Bermuda, then Canada, then back to US

        • Ran for election in Ohio governor race in 1863

          • Was dramatically beaten by John Brough

  • Lincoln writes public letter defending arrest of Vallandigham

    • “Wily agitator” encouraging people to desert army

      • Would result in deserters death

      • Better to punish the “wily agitator” then the “simple-minded soldier”

NY Draft Riots

• Product of March 1863 Enrollment Act

  • If district did not meet volunteer quota, all eligible men enrolled and drafted by lottery

  • Class tensions resulting from draft

    • Could pay $300 dollars or hire substitute to avoid service

• NY Draft Riot

  • July 13-16 in Manhattan

  • Initially an attack on draft office, but then became attack on Repiublican party and on free black people

    • Led by Irish and German immigrants

    • Destroyed office of Horace Greeley’s New York Tribune

    • Burned Colored Orphan Asylum to the ground

    • Massacred free black men, women, and children

  • Stoked by Copperhead Democrats

    • Exploiting immigrant’s and poor’s grievances

      • Irish Catholic poor

        • Concerned that emancipation would lead to economic displacement

  • Lincoln solved by pacifying Democrats

    • Gave control of draft to General John Dix (Democrat) who used state troops to conduct draft and held first lottery in Republican district