amstud - unit 5a vocabulary

Manifest Destiny

the popular belief that the United States had a divine mission to extend its power and civilization across North America; enthusiasm spread in the 1840s

Sam Houston

led the Texan army to victory over Mexico in the Battle of San Jacinto; leader in giving Texas its independence

the Alamo

Mexican army led by Santa Anna attacked this building in San Antonio, killing every one of its American defenders

Election of 1844

Democratic party split into two; Northern wing opposed immediate annexation, Southern wing proannexation; deadlocked the convention; James K. Polk won the election

James K. Polk

Candidate for the Democrats in the Election of 1844; supported Manifest Destiny, annexation of Texas, acquisition of California

“Fifty-four Forty or Fight!”

Democratic slogan that appealed strongly to American Westerners and Southern expansionists; the border of the Oregon territory that expansionists wanted

General Zachary Taylor

General that moved army toward the Rio Grande in order to settle conflict with Mexico regarding boundary lines for Texas’s southern border

John C. Fremont

leader in overthrowing Mexican rule in the region of California in June 1846, proclaiming California to be an independent republic known as the Bear Flag Republic

Mexican Cession

part of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo; U.S. took possession of the former Mexican provinces of California and New Mexico; U.S. paid $15 million and assumed responsibility for any claims of American citizens against Mexico

Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo

the treaty negotiated with the U.S. and Mexico regarding the Mexican-American War; recognized the Rio Grande as the southern border of Texas and included the Mexican Cession

Wilmot Proviso

U.S. Congressman proposed that a bill be amended to forbid slavery in any territory acquired from Mexico; appealed to voters who didn’t want competition with enslaved labor; passed the House but defeated in the Senate, where Southern states had greater influence

Ostend Manifesto

U.S. President Franklin Pierce secretly negotiated to buy Cuba from Spain; enraged antislavery members of Congress due to Pierce being pro-slavery; forced Pierce to drop the scheme

Gadsden Purchase

President Pierce purchased a small strip of land from Mexico in 1853 for $10 million

Free-Soil Movement

movement of Northerners who supported the Wilmot Proviso; land to the West should be dedicated to Whites only, not slaves; wanted to prevent the expansion of slavery

popular sovereignty

senator Lewis Cass proposed the idea that slavery permittance in a new state should be decided by the people of that state rather than having Congress make the decision

Compromise of 1850

admitted CA to the U.S. as a free state, divide Mexican Cession into two territories and have popular sovereignty in both; ban the slave trade in the district of Columbia but permits Whites to trade the slaves already there; adopted a new Fugitive Slave Law 

nativists/nativism

hostility towards immigrants, such as the Germans and Irish; due to ethnicity/religion or fear of immigrants taking jobs from native-born Americans

“Know-Nothing” Party

also known as the American Party; a secretive antiforeign society (opposed immigrants); gained strength, particularly in the New England/Mid-Atlantic states

Fugitive Slave Law

helped owners track down runaway slaves who have escaped to a northern state, capture them, and return them to their owners; anyone who attempted to hide a runaway was subject to heavy penalties

Underground Railroad

loose network of activists who helped enslaved people escape to freedom in the North; most “conductors” were free African Americans

Harriet Tubman

woman who escaped slavery and made +19 trips in the South to help some 300 enslaved people escape 

Uncle Tom’s Cabin

novel about the conflict of a slave and the brutal white slave owner; depicted the cruelties of slavery in an emotional way; moved a generation of Northerners to regard all slave owners as cruel and inhuman

Harriet Beecher Stowe

abolitionist and author of Uncle Tom’s Cabin

Impending Crisis of the South

a novel written by Hinton R. Helper; used statistics to demonstrate to fellow Southerners that slavery was weakening the economy

“positive good” argument

pro-slavery argument popular in the South; contended that slavery was not a necessary evil but a beneficial institution; enslaved people were better cared for under a system of slavery than they would be if they were free laborers

George Fitzhugh

leading advocate of the "positive good" theory of slavery; author of the novel “Sociology for the South"; argued that slavery was a more humane system than the free labor of the North