APUSH: Period 5 (1844-1877)

Westward Migration

Year: 1840s-1870s

Summary: Americans moved west for land, gold, and new opportunities, driven by Manifest Destiny.

Significance: Increased conflict with Native Americans and Mexico; intensified debates over slavery's expansion.

Manifest Destiny

Year: 1840s

Summary: Belief that the U.S. was destined to expand across the continent.

Significance: Justified westward expansion and contributed to the Mexican-American War and Native displacement.

James K. Polk's Presidency (1845-1849)

Year: 1845-1849 (presidency)

Summary: Expansionist president who led the U.S. during the Mexican-American War and oversaw the Oregon and Texas annexations.

Significance: Helped fulfill Manifest Destiny but deepened sectional tensions over new territories.

Texas Annexation

Year: 1845

Summary: U.S. annexed Texas after it declared independence from Mexico in 1836.

Significance: Angered Mexico and helped trigger the Mexican-American War.

Mexican-American War

Year: 1846-1848

Summary: Conflict over U.S. annexation of Texas and boundary disputes; ended with the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo.

Significance: Added vast new territory (Mexican Cession), reigniting debates over slavery in the West.

Mexican Cession

Year: 1848

Summary: Land (including CA, NV, UT, AZ, NM) gained from Mexico after the war. Significance: Reignited the debate over slavery's expansion and contributed to sectionalism.

Wilmot Proviso

Year: 1846

Summary: Proposed amendment to ban slavery in any territory gained from the Mexican-American War.

Significance: Though it failed, it intensified sectional conflict and revealed deep divisions over slavery's expansion.

Gadsden Purchase

Year: 1853

Summary: U.S. bought land from Mexico (southern Arizona and New Mexico) for $10 million to build a transcontinental railroad.

Significance: Marked the final territorial acquisition in the continental U.S. and highlighted sectional competition over slavery and infrastructure routes.

American Indian Removal

Year: Continued through 1840s-1870s

Summary: Native tribes were forcibly removed or confined to reservations as settlers expanded west.

Significance: Led to violence and dispossession; destroyed Native ways of life across the Plains and West.

Homestead Act

Year: 1862

Summary: Gave 160 acres of free land to settlers willing to live on and improve it for five years.

Significance: Encouraged westward expansion and development of the American frontier but led to displacement of Native Americans.

Pacific Railway Act

Year: 1862

Summary: Authorized construction of the transcontinental railroad, providing government support and land grants to railroad companies.

Significance: Connected the East and West, boosted trade and migration, and intensified settlement of the West.

Irish and German Immigration

Year: 1840s-1850s

Summary: Millions came due to famine (Irish) and political unrest (German). Irish settled in cities and German in the Midwest. Also called old immigrants

Significance: Transformed cities, fueled labor, and provoked nativist backlash.

Anti-Catholic Nativist Movement

Year: 1840s-1850s

Summary: Native-born Protestants opposed Catholic immigrants (esp. Irish).

Significance: Led to the rise of the Know-Nothing Party and growing anti-immigrant sentiment.

Ideological and Economic Differences Over Slavery

Year: 1840s-1860s

Summary: The North industrialized and opposed slavery's expansion; the South remained agricultural and slave-dependent.

Significance: Created deep sectional divides that led to the Civil War.

California Gold Rush

Year: 1849

Summary: Discovery of gold drew hundreds of thousands to California.

Significance: Rapid population growth led to CA statehood and increased pressure on Native land.

Compromise of 1850

Year: 1850

Summary: Admitted CA as a free state, allowed popular sovereignty in new territories, and passed a stricter Fugitive Slave Act.

Significance: Temporarily eased tensions but inflamed Northern resistance to slavery.

Fugitive Slave Act

Year: 1850

Summary: Required return of runaway slaves; Northern states passed laws to resist it.

Significance: Increased Northern support for abolition and heightened sectional conflict.

Kansas-Nebraska Act

Year: 1854

Summary: Allowed popular sovereignty in Kansas and Nebraska, repealing the Missouri Compromise.

Significance: Led to "Bleeding Kansas", rise of the Republican Party, and outrage in the north.

Bleeding Kansas

Year: 1854-1856

Summary: Violent clashes in Kansas between pro- and anti-slavery settlers after the Kansas-Nebraska Act.

Significance: Exposed the failure of popular sovereignty and symbolized the breakdown of political compromise.

Sumner-Brooks Incident

Year: 1856

Summary: Congressman Preston Brooks violently beat Senator Charles Sumner after an anti-slavery speech. Significance:

Highlighted increasing political violence and deepened North-South animosity.

Free-Soil Movement

Year: 1848-1850s

Summary: Opposed the expansion of slavery into western territories.

Significance: Helped form the Republican Party and shifted political focus to slavery expansion. Lincoln used movement as part of campaign.

Abolitionists

Year: 1830s-1860s

Summary: Activists like William Lloyd Garrison, Fredrick Douglas, and Sojourner Truth called for the immediate end of slavery.

Significance: Built pressure that made slavery a national moral and political issue.

Frederick Douglass

Year: 1840s-1870s

Summary: Former enslaved man, abolitionist, writer, and speaker.

Significance: His powerful writings and speeches humanized the enslaved and inspired the abolitionist cause.

William Lloyd Garrison

Year: 1831-1870s (active years)

Summary: Radical abolitionist and founder of the newspaper The Liberator, which called for the immediate end of slavery.

Significance: One of the most influential voices in the abolitionist movement; helped inspire Northern anti-slavery sentiment and moral arguments against slavery.

Harriet Beecher Stowe

Year: 1852 (Uncle Tom's Cabin)

Summary: Her novel exposed the cruelty of slavery to Northern readers. Wrote uncle tomes cabin

Significance: Widened anti-slavery sentiment and angered the South.

John Brown

Year: 1859 (Harpers Ferry Raid)

Summary: Radical abolitionist who led a failed raid to spark a slave rebellion.

Significance: Became a martyr in the North and a terrorist in the South, deepening sectional divisions.

Slavery Argument: Positive Good

Year: 1830s-1860s

Summary: Southern leaders claimed slavery was a positive good and biblically justified.

Significance: Intensified ideological battles over slavery and set the South on a collision course with the North.

Emergence of the Republican Party

Year: 1854

Summary: Formed in opposition to the Kansas-Nebraska Act and slavery's expansion.

Significance: Became the main anti-slavery party and Lincoln's party by 1860.

Sectional Parties; Sectionalism

Year: 1850s

Summary: Political parties began aligning with regional interests rather than national unity.

Significance: Destroyed the Second Party System and contributed to the collapse of the Union.

Election of 1860

Year: 1860

Summary: Lincoln won without any Southern electoral votes.

Significance: Triggered the secession of Southern states and the start of the Civil War.

Abraham Lincoln (1861-1865)

Year: 1860-1865

Summary: 16th president who preserved the Union and issued the Emancipation Proclamation.

Significance: His leadership redefined the purpose of the war and led to the end of slavery.

Secession

Year: 1860-1861

Summary: Eleven Southern states left the Union after Lincoln's election.

Significance: Direct cause of the Civil War; led to the formation of the Confederacy.

Civil War - Key Events

Ft. Sumter (1861): First shots of the war.

Anaconda Plan: Union strategy to blockade and split the South.

Vicksburg (1863): Gave Union control of Mississippi River.

Gettysburg (1863): Major Union victory; turning point of the war.

Sherman's March to the Sea (1864): Total war campaign across Georgia.

Appomattox Courthouse (1865): Lee surrendered to Grant, ending the war.

Significance: Preserved the Union, ended slavery, and changed the balance of federal power.

Emancipation Proclamation

Year: 1863

Summary: Freed slaves in Confederate states and reframed the war as a fight against slavery.

Significance: Gained moral support at home and abroad; prevented foreign intervention on the Confederacy's behalf.

Gettysburg Address

Year: 1863

Summary: Lincoln's speech honoring fallen soldiers and redefining the war as a struggle for equality and democracy.

Significance: Became a foundational statement of American ideals and unity.

13th Amendment

Year: 1865

Summary: Abolished slavery and involuntary servitude, except as punishment for a crime.

Significance: Legally ended slavery in the United States, fulfilling a key goal of the Civil War.

14th Amendment

Year: 1868

Summary: Granted citizenship to all people born or naturalized in the U.S., including formerly enslaved people, and guaranteed equal protection under the law.

Significance: Became the foundation for future civil rights legislation and court decisions

15th Amendment

Year: 1870

Summary: Prohibited denying a citizen the right to vote based on race, color, or previous condition of servitude.

Significance: Gave Black men the legal right to vote, though Southern states would later find ways to suppress this right. Partially led to increase in Black men in government.

Reconstruction - Presidential and Radical

Year: 1865-1877

Summary: Presidential Reconstruction (Lenient); Radical Reconstruction (stricter, military oversight of the South).

Significance: Tried to rebuild the South and integrate freedmen; led to major resistance and backlash.

Sharecropping System

Year: 1865-1877

Summary: Freedmen and poor whites farmed land for a share of the crop; often led to debt.

Significance: Replaced slavery with a new system of economic dependency and exploitation.

South Resisting ReConstruction

Year: 1865-1877

Summary: Southern leaders used Black Codes, violence, and voter suppression to undermine Reconstruction.

Significance: Limited Black freedom and political power despite new constitutional rights

New South

Year: Post-1865

Summary: Idea of a modern, industrialized South after the Civil War.

Significance: Economic change was limited; most of the South remained agricultural and racially segregated.

Freedmen's Bureau

Year: 1865-1872

Summary: Government agency that helped former slaves with education, housing, and jobs. Integration into society.

Significance: Short-lived but critical in early Reconstruction efforts; met with Southern resistance. Had most impact in education.

Compromise of 1877

Summary: Hayes became president in exchange for ending Reconstruction by withdrawing federal troops from the South.

Significance: Marked the end of federal efforts to protect Black rights; began the Jim Crow era.