Key Figures, Events, and Legislation of the American Civil War and Abolitionist Movement

Abolitionism

a powerful political and social movement, primarily in the 18th and 19th centuries, dedicated to ending the institution of slavery and liberating enslaved people, rooted in moral, religious, and humanitarian beliefs that slavery violated human rights

William Lloyd Garrison

was an American abolitionist, journalist, and social reformer. He is best known for his widely read anti-slavery newspaper The Liberator, which Garrison founded in 1831 and published in Boston until slavery in the United States was abolished by the Thirteenth Amendment in 1865.

Frederick Douglass

(1817-1895) American abolitionist and writer, he escaped slavery and became a leading African American spokesman and writer. He published his biography, The Narrative of the Life of I______ ________, and founded the abolitionist newspaper, the North Star.

Uncle Tom's Cabin - Harriet Beecher Stowe

Book written that revealed the harsh reality of slavery

Mexican Cession

1848. Awarded as part of the Treaty of Guadalupe-Hidalgo after the Mexican American War. U.S. paid $15 million for 525,000 square miles.

Wilmot Proviso

1846 proposal that outlawed slavery in any territory gained from the War with Mexico

Free Soil Party

A political party dedicated to stopping the expansion of slavery

Compromise of 1850

(1) California admitted as free state, (2) territorial status and popular sovereignty of Utah and New Mexico, (3) resolution of Texas-New Mexico boundaries, (4) federal assumption of Texas debt, (5) slave trade abolished in DC, and (6) new fugitive slave law; advocated by Henry Clay and Stephen A. Douglas

Stephen Douglas

A moderate, who introduced the Kansas-Nebraska Act in 1854 and popularized the idea of popular sovereignty.

Kansas-Nebraska Act

1854 - Created Nebraska and Kansas as states and gave the people in those territories the right to chose to be a free or slave state through popular sovereignty.

Know-Nothing Party

Political party of the 1850s that was anti-Catholic and anti-immigrant

Republican Party

1854 - anti-slavery Whigs and Democrats, Free Soilers and reformers from the Northwest met and formed party in order to keep slavery out of the territories

Bleeding Kansas

(1856) a series of violent fights between pro-slavery and anti-slavery forces in Kansas who had moved to Kansas to try to influence the decision of whether or not Kansas would a slave state or a free state.

John Brown

Abolitionist who was hanged after leading an unsuccessful raid at Harper's Ferry, Virginia (1800-1858)

Sumner-Brooks Incident

Sumner was an MA senator and unyielding foe of slavery. He was physically attacked by Senator Brooks of SC in retaliation for a two-day speech made denouncing the proslavery Missourians who had crossed into Kansas and Brook's pro-slavery uncle who supported the Missourians- showed the split of the government

Lecompton Constitution

supported the existence of slavery in the proposed state and protected rights of slaveholders. It was rejected by Kansas, making Kansas an eventual free state.

Dred Scott v. Sanford

Supreme Court case that decided US Congress did not have the power to prohibit slavery in federal territories and slaves, as private property, could not be taken away without due process - basically slaves would remain slaves in non-slave states and slaves could not sue because they were not citizens

Roger Taney

chief justice of the supreme court who wrote an opinion in the 1857 Dred Scott case that declared the Missouri compromise unconstitutional

Abraham Lincoln

16th President of the United States saved the Union during the Civil War and emancipated the slaves; was assassinated by Booth (1809-1865)

Lincoln-Douglas Debates

series of debates between Abraham Lincoln and Stephen Douglas over the issue of slavery

Freeport Doctorine

statement made by Stephen Douglas during the Lincoln-Douglas debates that pointed out how people could use popular sovereignty to determine if their state or territory should permit slavery

Harpers Ferry Raid

Occurred in October of 1859. John Brown of Kansas attempted to create a major revolt among the slaves. He wanted to ride down the river and provide the slaves with arms from the North, but he failed to get the slaves organized. Brown was captured. The effects of Harper's Ferry Raid were as such: the South saw the act as one of treason and were encouraged to separate from the North, and Brown became a martyr to the northern abolitionist cause.

Election of 1860

Lincoln, the Republican candidate, won because the Democratic party was split over slavery. As a result, the South no longer felt like it has a voice in politics and a number of states seceded from the Union.

Fort Sumter

Federal fort in the harbor of Charleston, South Carolina; the confederate attack on the fort marked the start of the Civil War

Habeas Corpus

a writ requiring a person under arrest to be brought before a judge or into court, especially to secure the person's release unless lawful grounds are shown for their detention.

Border States

in the civil war the states between the north and the south: delaware, maryland, kentucky, and missouri

Confederate States of America

A republic formed in February of 1861 and composed of the eleven Southern states that seceded from the United States

Jefferson Davis

President of the Confederate States of America

Bull Run

1st real battle, Confederate victory, Washingtonian spectators gather to watch battle, Gen. Jackson stands as Stonewall and turns tide of battle in favor of Confederates, realization that war is not going to be quick and easy for either side

Thomas Stonewall Jackson

Confederate general whose men stopped Union assault during the Battle of Bull Run

Anaconda Plan

Northern Civil War strategy to starve the South by blockading seaports and controlling the Mississippi River

George McClellan

A general for northern command of the Army of the Potomac in 1861; nicknamed "Tardy George" because of his failure to move troops to Richmond; lost battle vs. General Lee near the Chesapeake Bay; Lincoln fired him twice.

Robert E. Lee

Confederate general who had opposed secession but did not believe the Union should be held together by force

Antietam

(AL), 1862, the first major battle in the American Civil War to take place on Northern soil. It was the bloodiest single-day battle in American history, with almost 23,000 casualties. After this "win" for the North, Lincoln announced the Emancipation Proclamation

Ulysses S. Grant

an American general and the eighteenth President of the United States (1869-1877). He achieved international fame as the leading Union general in the American Civil War.

Emancipation Proclamation

Issued by abraham lincoln on september 22, 1862 it declared that all slaves in the confederate states would be free

Gettysburg

A large battle in the American Civil War, took place in southern Pennsylvania from July 1 to July 3, 1863. The battle is named after the town on the battlefield. Union General George G. Meade led an army of about 90,000 men to victory against General Robert E. Lee's Confederate army of about 75,000. Gettysburg is the war's most famous battle because of its large size, high cost in lives, location in a northern state, and for President Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg Address.

Vicksburg

Grant besieged the city from May 18 to July 4, 1863, until it surrendered, yielding command of the Mississippi River to the Union.

Gettysburg Address

(1863) a speech given by Abraham Lincoln after the Battle of Gettysburg, in which he praised the bravery of Union soldiers and renewed his commitment to winning the Civil War; supported the ideals of self-government and human rights

Sherman's March to the Sea

during the civil war, a devastating total war military campaign, led by union general William Tecumseh Sherman, that involved marching 60,000 union troops through Georgia from Atlanta to Savannah and destroying everything along there way.

Appomattox Courthouse

the Virginia town where Robert E. Lee surrendered to Ulysses S. Grant in 1865, ending the Civil War

John Wilkes Booth

was an American stage actor who, as part of a conspiracy plot, assassinated Abraham Lincoln, the 16th President of the United States, at Ford's Theatre in Washington, D.C. on April 14, 1865.