Union in Peril (Decade of Crisis)

Enforcement of Fugitive Slave Law

Enforcement of Fugitive Slave Law

• Law's purpose was to help owners track down runaway enslaved ppl who escaped to Northern state, capture them, & return them to their Southern owners

• Law removed fugitive slave cases from state courts & made them exclusive to jurisdiction of fed gov't

• Also authorized special US commissioners to use warrants to arrest fugitives

• A captured person who claimed to be free & not someone who had just escaped slavery was denied right of trial by jury

• State & local law enforcement officials were required to help enforce fed law

Opposition to Fugitive Slave Law

• Passage of this law in Comp of 1850 persuaded many Southerners to accept that Cali would be free state

• Hwvr, many Northerners bitterly resent law

• RESULT: drove wedge btwn North & South

• Anyone who attempted to hide runaway/obstruct enforcement of law was subject to heavy penalties

• Hwvr, black & white activists in North bitterly resisted law

• Thru court cases, protests, & sometimes force, tried to protect Afr Amers from being returned- or taken for the first time- into slavery

Underground Railroad

• Loose network of activists who help enslaved ppl escape to freedom in North/Canada

• Most "conductors" & those operating the "stations" were free Afr Amers & ppl who had escaped slavery themselves w/ the assistance of white abolitionists

• Most famous conductor = Harriet Tubman

• Free black citizens in North & abolitionists also organized vigilance committees to protect fugitive slaves from slave catchers

• During Civil War, Afr Amer leaders like Frederick Douglass, Harriet Tubman, & Sojourner Truth worked for emancipation & supported Black soldiers

Uncle Tom’s Cabin

• Most influential book of its day

• Abt conflict btwn an enslaved man, Tom, with brutal white slave owner, Simon Legere

• By Northern writer Harriet Beecher Stowe

• Moved a generation of Northerners and many Euros to regard all slave owners as cruel & inhuman

• Southerners condemns the "untruths" in novel & looked upon it as one more proof of North's incurable prejudice against Southern way of life

• Later, when Prez Lincoln met Stowe, he said "so you're the little woman who wrote the book that made this great war"

• In response to Stowe's book, Mary Eastman wrote pro-slavery novel Aunt Phillis's Cabin

  • Portrayed world of kind slaveowners & happily enslaved ppl

Impending Crisis of the South

• By Hinton R. Helper

• Nonfiction

• Attacked slavery from another angle

  • Used statistics to demonstrate to fellow Southerners that slavery weakened the South's economy

  • Southern states quickly banned book but it was widely distributed in North by antislavery Free-Soil leaders

Southern Reaction to Abolitionist Literature

• Responding to Northern literature that condemned slavery, proslavery Southern whites counterattacked, arguing that slavery was good for both master and slave

• Pointed out that slavery sanctioned the Bible and grounded in philosophy and history

• Slavery also permitted by US Constitution

• Southern Authorities contrasted conditions of Northern wage workers- "wage slaves" forced to work long hours in factories & mines- w/ familial bonds developed on plantations btwn slaves and masters

• George Fitzhugh, best-known proslavery author, questioned principle of equal rights for "unequal men" and attacked wage system as worse than slavery

• Wrote Sociology for the South & Cannibals All!

Effect of Law & Literature

• Fugitive Slave Law & books on slavery increasingly polarized nation

• Many Northerners who opposed expansion of slavery only for economic reasons and had scorned abolition became more concerned abt slavery as a moral issue

• At same time, growing num of Southerners, particularly wealthy ones, became more convinced that Northerners would abolish slavery and way of life based upon it as soon as they could

3 Major Issues That Divided North & South

1. Attitudes abt morality of slavery

2. Views abt constitutional rights of states, particularly right to protect slavery

3. Differences over economic policies btwn free-labor industrial North and slave-labor agricultural South

The Election of 1852

• Signs of trouble for Whig party appeared in 1852 election for prez

• Whigs nominated another military hero of Mex War, General Winfield Scott

• Attempting to ignore slavery issue, Whigs concentrated on party's traditional platform

  • Improving roads and harbors

• But Scott quickly discovered that sectional issues couldn't be held in check

• Antislavery and Southern factions of party fell to quarreling and party was on verge of splitting apart

• Dems nominated compromise candidate, Franklin Pierce of NH, who they hoped would be safer choice, one acceptable to ppl in all regions

  • A Northerner, Pierce was acceptable to Southern Dems bc supported Fugitive Slave Law

• In electoral College, Dems won all but 4 states, suggesting days of Whig Party were numbered

The Kansas-Nebraska Act (1854)

• Dems, firmly in control of both White House & Cong, found they could avoid issue of slavery in territories

• Senator Stephen A. Douglas of Illinois proposed building transcontinental railroad thru center of country, w/ major terminus In Chicago, to promote Western settlement (& inc value of his own real estate in Chicago)

• Southerners preferred more southerly route

• To win Southerner support, Douglas introduced bill to divide Nebraska Territory into 2 parts- The Kansas and Nebraska territories, & allow settlers in each territory to decide whether to allow slavery

Impact of The Kansas-Nebraska Act (1854)

• Since these territories were located north of the 36deg3' line, Douglas's bill gave Southerner an opportunity to expand slavery into lands that had been closed to it by the Missouri Comp of 1820

• Many Northern Dems condemned bill as a surrender to "slave pwr"

• Still, after 3 months of bitter debate, both houses of Cong passed Douglas's bill as Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854, and Prez Pierce signed it into law

• After 1854, conflicts btwn antislavery and proslavery forces exploded, both in Kansas and on floor of US Senate

Context of “Bleeding Kansas”

• Stephen Douglas, Kansas-Nebraska Act sponsor, expected slavery issue in territory to be settled peacefully by antislavery farmers from Midwest who migrated to Kansas and constituted majority

• Slavery holders from neighboring Missouri also set up homesteads in Kansas as means of winning control for South

• Northern abolitionists and Free-Soilers responded by organizing the New England Emigrant Aid Company (1855), which paid for transportation of antislavery settlers to Kansas

• Fighting broke out btwn proslavery and antislavery grps, & territory became known as "bleeding Kansas"

Midst of “Bleeding Kansas”

• Proslavery Missourians, called "border ruffians" by their enemies, crossed border to create proslavery legislature in Lecompton, Kansas

• Antislavery settlers refused to recognize this gov't and created their own legislature in Topeka

• 1856-> proslavery forces attacked free-soil town of Lawrence, killing abt 2 and destroying homes and businesses

• Two days later-> John Brown, stern abolitionists, retaliated

  • Attacked proslavery farm settlement at Pottawatomie Creek, killing 5

Reaction to “Bleeding Kansas”

• In Washington, Pierce admin did nothing to keep order in Kansas territory and failed to support honest elections there

• As Kansas became bloodier, Dem Party became more divided btwn its Northern & Southern factions

• Plan to let territories decide on slavery for themselves had resulted in chaos & bloodshed

• Caning of Senator Sumner

Caning of Senator Sumner

• Violence in Kansas spilled over into halls of US Cong

• 1856-> MA senator Charles Sumner attacked Dem admin in vitriolic speech, "The Crime Against Kansas"

• His remarks included personal charges against SC senator Andrew Butler

• Butler's nephew, Congressman Preston Brooks, defend uncle's honor by walking into Senate chamber and beating Sumner over the head repeated with a cane

• Sumner never fully recovered from the attack

• Action by Brooks outraged North, and the House voted to censure him while Southerners applauded deed

• Sumner-Brooks incident was another sign of growing passions on both sides

Founding of Republican Party

• Inc tensions over slavery divided Northern & Southern Dems & broke apart Whig party

• Ex-Whigs scattered

  • Those frightened abt immigration joined Know-Nothing Party

• With support of new members, Know-Nothings won a few local and state elections in the mid-1850s

• Hwvr, as expansion of slavery became paramount political issue, signif of immigration decline, and along with it, the Know-Nothing Party

• Ex-Whigs who supported expansion of slavery usually joined Dem Party

• South became core of party, although Dems were still strong in North

• Former Whigs who opposed Slavery expansion formed core of new party

• The Republican Party was founded in Wisconsin in 1854 as reaction to passage of Kansas-Neb Act

About Republican Party

• Composed of Free-Soilers and antislavery Whigs & Dems, its purpose was to oppose spread of slavery in territories-not to end slavery itself

• Its first platform called for repeal of both Kansa-Neb Act and Fugitive Slave Law

• As violence inc in Kansas, more ppl, inc some abolitionists, joined Repub Party, and it became second largest party in Country

  • But it was strictly Northern , or sectional, party

  • Its success threaten & alienated the South

The Election of 1856

• Repubs' first test of strength came in presidential election of 1856

• Their nominee was CA senator, the explorer and "Pathfinder," John C Fremont

• Republican platform called for no expansion of slavery, free homesteads, & probusiness protective tariff

• The Know-Nothings also competed strongly in this election, w/ their candidate, former Prez Milliard Fillmore, winning 20% of popular vote

• As the one major national party, Dems expected to win

  • Nominated James Buchanan of PA, rejecting Prez Pierce and Stephen Douglas bc they were too closely identified w/ controversial Kansas-Neb Act

Result of Election of 1856

• As expected, Dems won majority of popular and electoral vote

• Repubs made strong showing for sectional party

  • Fermont carried 11 of the 16 free states

• Some predicted that the antislavery Repubs could win the White House without a single vote from the South

• Election of 1856 foreshadowed emergence of pwrful political party that would win all but 4 presidents btwn 1860 & 1932

Lecompton Constitution

• One of Buchanan's 1st challenges as prez in 1857 was to decide whether to accept or reject proslavery state constitution for Kansas submitted by Southern legislature at Lecompton

• Buchanan knew that Lecompton Constitution, as it was called, didn't have majority support

• Even so, he asked Cong to accept document and admit Kansas as slave state

• Cong didn't do so b/c many Dems, inc Stephen Douglas, joined w/ Repubs in rejecting constitution

• The next yr, 1858, the proslavery document was overwhelmingly rejected by Kansas settlers, most of whom were antislavery Repubs

Dred Scott v. Sanford

• Congressional folly & presidential ineptitude contributed to sectional crisis of 1850s

• Supreme Court worsened crisis when it infuriated many Northerners w/ controversial proslavery decision in case of the enslaved man named Dred Scott

• Scott had been held in slavery in Missouri and then taken to free territory of Wisconsin where he lived for 2 yrs before returning to Missouri

• Arguing that his residence on free soil made him free citizen, Scott sued for his freedom in Missouri in 1846

• Case worked its way thru court system

• Finally reached Supreme Court which rendered its decision in March 1857, only 2 days after Buchanan was sworn in as prez

• Presiding over court was Chief Justice Roger Taney, a Southern Dem

Result of Scott v. Sanford & Why

• Majority of Court decided against Scott and gave these reasons:

  • Dred Scott had no right to sue in fed court b/c Framers of the Constitution didn't intend Afr Amers to be US citizens

  • Cong didn't have pwr to deprive any person of property w/o due process of law. If slaves were form of property, then Cong couldn't exclude slavery from any fed territory

  • Missouri Comp was unconstitutional b/c it excluded slavery from Wisconsin and other Northern territories

Impact of Dred Scott v. Sanford

• Court's ruling delighted Southern Dems and infuriated Northern Repubs

• In effect, Court declared all parts of Western territories open to slavery

• Repubs denounced as "greatest cry in the annuals of the republic"

• Timing of decision, after Buchanan's inauguration, led Northerners to suspect Dem prez and majority on Supreme Court, including Taney, had planned the decision so that it would settle slavery question

• Inc Northern suspicions of conspiracy and induced thousands of Dems to vote Repub

• Northern Dems like Senator Douglas were left w/ impossible task of supporting popular sovereignty w/o rejecting Dred Scott decision

• Douglas's hopes for compromise and presidency were in jeopardy

Context of Douglas-Lincoln Debates

• 1858: focus of nation was on Douglas's campaign for reelection as senator from Illinois

• Challenging him was successful trial lawyer & former member of Illinois legislature, Abraham Lincoln, as Repub candidate

  • Lincoln served 1 term in Cong in 1840s as Whig

  • Nationally, unknown compared to Douglas (the Little Giant)

    • Champion of pop sovereignty & possible best hope for holding nation 2gether if elected prez in 1860

• Lincoln was not abolitionists - moderate who was against expansion of slavery

  • Spoke effectively of slavery as moral issue

    • "If slavery is not wrong, nothing is wrong"

Douglas-Lincoln Debates

• In debate in Freeport, Illinois, Lincoln challenged Douglas to reconcile pop sovereignty w/ Dred Scott decision

• In what became known as Freeport Doctrine, Douglas responded that slavery couldn't exist in community if local citizens didn't pass laws (slave codes) maintaining it

• His views angered Southern Dems b/c from their POV Douglas didn't go far enough in supporting implication of Dred Scott decision

• Douglas won campaign for reelection to US senate

• In long run, hwvr, lost ground in his own party by alienating Southern Dems

• Lincoln, on the other hand, emerged from debates as national figure and  leading contender for Repub nomination for prez 1860

Context of Election of 1860

• In Northern states outside Illinois where Douglas & Dems defeated Lincoln, the Repubs did well in congressional elections of 1858

• Greatly alarmed may Southerners

  • Worried not only abt antislavery plank in Repub's program but also abt that party's economic program, which favored Northern industrialists at expense of South

• Higher tariffs pledged by Repubs would help Northern businesses but hurt South, which depended on exporting cotton

• Events leading up to Lincoln's election & secession of 11 Southern states from the Union set up stage for war

On the Road to Secession

• Southern fears grew that a Repub victory in 1860 would spell disaster for their economy & threaten their "constitutional right," as affirmed by Supreme Court, to own enslaved ppl as property

• Adding to their fears were Northern radicals supporting John Brown, the man who had massacred 5 farmers in Kansas in 1856

• John Brown's Raid at Harpers Ferry

• election of 1860

John Brown’s Raid at Harper’s Ferry

• John Brown confirmed South's worst fears of radical abolitionism when he tried to start uprising of enslaved ppl in VA

• Oct 1859: led small band of followers, including his 4 sons and some formerly enslaved ppl, to attack federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry

• His impractical plan was to use guns from arsenal to arm VA's enslaved Afr Amers, whom he expected to rise up in revolt

• Fed troops under command of Robert E. Lee captured Brown and his band after 2-day siege

• Brown & 6 of his followers were tired for treason by state of VA

• At trial, Brown spoke w/ simple eloquence of his humanitarian motives in wanting to free enslaved ppl

• Hwvr, he was convicted & hanged

Impact of John Brown’s Raid at Harper’s Ferry

• Brown's raid divided Northerners

• Moderates condemned his use of violence, while abolitionists hailed him as martyr

• Southern whites saw raid and Northern support for it as finally proof of North's true intentions- to use slave revolts to destroy the South

• After John Brown's raid, more and more Amers feared that their country was moving to disintegration

• Presidential election of 1860 would test Union

Breakup of Democratic Party

• As 1860 began, Dem Party represented last hope for compromise

• Dems held their national convention in Charleston, SC

• Steph Douglas was party's leading candidate & most capable of winning presidency

• Blocking his nomination were angry Southerners and supporters of Prez Buchanan

• After deadlocking at Charleston, Dems held 2nd convention in Baltimore

• Many delegates from slave states walked out, enabling remaining delegates to nominate Douglas on platform of pop sovereignty and enforcement of Fugitive Slave Law

• Southern Dems then held their own convention in Baltimore and nominated VP John C. Breckinridge f KY as candidate

• Southern Dem platform called for unrestricted extension of slavery in territories in annexation of Cuba, a Spanish colony that still practiced slavery

Republican Nomination of Lincoln

• When Repubs met in Chicago, they enjoyed hopes of easy win over divided Dems

• They drafted platform that appealed to economic self-interest of Northerns and Westerners

• Called for exclusion of slavery from territories, protective tariff for industry, free land for homesteaders, and internal improvements to encourage Western settlement, including railroad to Pacific

• To win moderates of slavery, they rejected well-known NY Senator William Seward,  a strong opponent of slavery

• They turned to little-known Illinois lawyer of Abraham Lincoln, a strong debater

• They believed that Lincoln could carry Midwestern states of Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio

• One cloud darkened the Repub's otherwise bright future

  • In South, radicals warned that if the country elected Lincoln, their states would leave the Union

Constitutional Union Party

• Fearing Repub victory, group of former Whigs, Know-Nothings, & moderate Dems formed new party: Constitutional Union Party

• For prez, they nominated John Bell of TN & pledged enforcement of laws and Constitution and, above all, preservation of Union

Results of Election of 1860

• While Douglas campaigned across country, Lincoln remained at home in Springfield, Illinois, meeting Repub leaders and giving statements to press

• Election results were predictable

• Lincoln carried every free state of the North, which represented solid majority of 59% of electoral votes

• Breckinridge, Southern Dem, carried Deep South, leaving Douglas and Bell w/ just a few electoral votes in border states

• Hwvr, Lincoln won only 39.8% of popular vote, so he would be minority president

• New political reality was that populous free states has enough electoral votes to elect a prez w/o any electoral votes from South

• Southern fears that North would dominate fed gov't- and could soon threaten democracy- appeared to be coming true

Secession of Deep South

• In 1860, Repubs controlled neither Senate nor Supreme Court

• Even so, election of Lincoln was all that Southern secessionists needed to call for immediate disunion

• In Dec 1860: special convention in SC voted unanimously to secede, saying that they needed to protect slavery

• Within 6 weeks, state conventions in GA, FL, AL, MS, LA, & TX did the same

• In several states, particularly GA and AL, many ppl were uncertain abt or opposed secession

• Hwvr large slaveowners, arguing that states had right to defend slavery, prevailed

• In Feb 1861: representatives of 7 states of Deep South met Montgomery, AL, and created Confederate States of Amer

• Constitution of this Southern country was like US constitution, except that Confederacy placed limits on govt's pwr to impose tariffs and restrict slavery

• Elected pre & VP were Jefferson Davis of MS & Alexander Stephens of GA

• Crittenden Compromise

Critten Compromise

• Lame-duck prez (leader completing term after someone else has been elected into office), Buchanan had 5 months in office b4 Lincoln succeeded him

• Buchanan was conservative who did nothing to prevent secession

• Cong was more active

• In last-ditch effort to appease South, Senator John Crittenden of KY proposed constitutional amendment that would guarantee right to hold slaves in all territories south of old Missouri Comp line, 36deg30'

• Southern Whites who voted for secession believed they were acting in tradition of Revolution of 1776

• Argued that they had right to national independent & to dissolve constitutional compact that no longer protected them from "tyranny" of Northern rule

• Many also thought that Lincoln, like Buchanan, might permit secession w/o fight

• Those how thought this had badly miscalculated

A Nation Divided After Election of 1860

• When Lincoln took office as prez in March 1861, ppl wondered if he would challenge secession militarily

• In his inaugural address, Lincoln assured Southerners that he would not interfere w/ slavery where it existed

• At same time, he warned, no state had the right to break up Union

• He appealed for restraint: "In your hands, my dissatisfied fellow-countrymen, and not in mine, is the momentous issue of civil war. The gov't will not assail you. You can have no conflict w/o being yourselves the aggressors"

• Fort Sumter

• Secession of Upper South

• Keeping the Border States in Union

Fort Sumter

• Despite prez's message of conciliation, danger of war was acute

• Critical was status of fed forts in states that had secede

• Fort Sumter, in harbor of Charleston, SC, was cut off by Southern control of harbor

• Rather than either giving up Fort Sumter or attempting to defend it, Lincoln announced that he was sending provisions of food to small federal garrison

• He thus gave SC choice of either permitting fort to hold out or opening fire

• Carolina's guns thundered and thus, on April 12 1861, the war began

• Attack on Fort and its capture after 2 days of pounding united most Northerners behind patriotic fight to save Union

Secession of Upper South

• B4 SC attacked Fort S, only 7 states of Deep South had seceded

• After it was clear that Lincoln would use troops to defend Union, 4 states of Upper South- VA, NC, TN, & AR- seceded and joined Confederacy

• As in earlier states, decision to secede was controversial

• Confed's then moved their capital to Richmond, VA

• Ppl of western VA remained loyal to Union, becoming separate state in 1863

Keeping the Border States in Union

• 4 other slaveholders remained in Union

• Decisions of DE, MD, Missouri, & KY not to join the Confederacy were partly result of pro-Union sentiment in those states and partly the results of shrewd federal policies

• In MD, pro-secessionists attacked Union troops & threatened railroad to WA

• Union army resorted to martial law to keep state under fed control

• In Missouri, US troops prevented pro-South elements from gaining control although guerrilla forces for Confederacy were active during war

• In KY, state legislature voted to remain neutral

• Lincoln initially respected its neutrality & waited for South to isolate it before moving in fed troops

• Keeping border states in Union was military & political goal for Lincoln

• Their loss would inc Confed population by 50% and weaken North's strategic position

• Partly to avoid alienating Unionists in border states, Lincoln rejected initial calls for emancipation of slaves