AICE U.S. History: Origin of the Civil War

Missouri Compromise of 1820

(1820)- The issue was that Missouri wanted to join the Union as a slave state, therefore unbalancing the Union so there would be more slave states than free states. The compromise set it up so that Maine joined as a free state and Missouri joined as a slave state. Congress also made a line across the southern border of Missouri saying except for the state of Missouri, all states north of that line must be free states or states without slavery.

Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo

(1848)- Ended the Mexican-American War (1846-1848) and was signed in its namesake neighborhood of Mexico City. Its most significant result was the "Mexican Cession" transferring California, Nevada, Utah, and parts of four other states to the U.S. It also made the Rio Grande the boundary between Texas and Mexico.

Compromise of 1850

Series of legislation addressing slavery and the boundaries of territories acquired during the Mexican-American War. California was admitted as a free state, Texas received financial compensation for relinquishing claim to lands West of the Rio Grande river, the territory of New Mexico was organized with popular sovereignty on the slavery question , the slave trade was abolished in Washington, D.C., and the Fugitive Slave Law was passed. It temporarily defused sectional tensions in the United States, postponing the secession crisis and the American Civil War.

Fugitive Slave Act of 1850

The Fugitive Slave Act required states in which slavery was not allowed (the North) to return escaped slaves (back to the South) seeking refuge. This is important because it created more division between the North and South. This allowed government officials to arrest any person accused of being a runaway slave; all that was needed to take away someone's freedoms was words of a white person; northerners required to help capture runaways if requested, suspects had no right to trial.

Kansas-Nebraska Act - 1854

(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.

Uncle Tom's Cabin

Abolitionist book by Harriet Beecher Stowe, Written in 1853 that highly influenced England's view on the American Deep South and slavery and kept England from helping the South. This novel promoting abolition and intensified sectional conflict. Some considered it a propaganda.

abolitionist movement

The movement concentrated on ending slavery in the United States / Caused the greatest tension between the North and South / Often disagreed on tactics

Republican Party

After Congress passed the Kansas-Nebraska Act (1854), which opened those territories to slavery if the local residents voted that way (popular sovereignty). A firestorm of outrage brought together former Whigs and former Free Soil Democrats to form a new party in 1854-56, the Republican party. It included a program of rapid modernization involving the government promotion of industry, railroads, banks, free homesteads, and colleges, all to the annoyance of the South.

Dred Scott v. Sanford (1857)

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. This decision made the Missouri Compromise unconstitutional and helped cause the Civil War.

Lincoln-Douglas Debates

A series of debates between Republican Lincoln and Democrat Douglas during the 1858 U.S. Senate campaign in Illinois. During these debates, Lincoln forced Douglas to debate the issues of slavery, Douglas supported popular-sovereignty, Lincoln asserted that slavery should not spread to territories. Although Lincoln lost the election to Douglas, he was known throughout the country because of his aims in his debates.

During the debate, Lincoln was able to make Douglas confess with Freeport doctrine. He also believed that African-American should be guaranteed "Life, Liberty and the pursuit of happiness." Lincoln emerged as a strong Republican candidate.

Popular Sovereignty

A system in which the residents vote to decide an issue, this was attempted on the slavery issue in the western territories prior to the Civil War.

Freeport Doctrine

Idea authored by Stephen Douglas that claimed slavery could only exist when popular sovereignty said so. During the Lincoln-Douglas debates, Douglas said in his Freeport Doctrine that Congress couldn't force a territory to become a slave state against its will. This cost Douglas support in the south and split the Democratic party in the election 1860

John Brown & Harper's Ferry

A fervent abolitionist who believed God chose him to end slavery. He led a group in killing five supporters of slavery in Kansas. In October 1859 he led an unsuccessful attempt to capture a Federal armory at Harpers Ferry in Virginia; his goal was to use the weapons to arm slaves in the South and begin a larger slave revolt. He was executed. Abolitionists claimed him as a martyr but pro-slavery elements decried him as a northern agitator. His actions helped to increase tensions between north and south directly proceeding the civil war

South Carolina

First southern state to secede from the Union

Election of 1860

The election in which Abraham Lincoln was first elected President due to the schism of the Democrats. Caused a chain reaction of southern states to secede from the Union since they were afraid of Lincoln's policies., set the stage for the American Civil War. The nation had been divided throughout most of the 1850s on questions of states' rights and slavery in the territories. In 1860 this issue finally came to a head, fracturing the formerly dominant Democratic Party into Southern and Northern factions and bringing Abraham Lincoln and the Republican Party to power without the support of a single Southern State.

Confederate States of America (CSA; the South)

(1861-1865) Government established in Feb. 1861 after 7 Southern states seceded from the Union. Later joined by 4 more states from the Upper South. Jefferson Davis was the president of the Confederacy. Slaves are the foundation of their agricultural lifestyle.

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.

Secession

Formal withdrawal from a group; in US history, the formal withdrawal of 11 Southern states from the Union in 1860-1861, leading to the Civil War. The seceding states joined together to form the Confederate States of America (CSA). The eleven states of the CSA, in order of secession, were: South Carolina (seceded December 20, 1860), Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Texas, Virginia, Arkansas, North Carolina, and Tennessee.

Martial Law

The law applied in occupied territory by the military authority of the occupying power; the law administered by military forces that is invoked by a government in an emergency when the civilian law enforcement agencies are unable to maintain public order and safety.

Border States

The states between the North and the South that were divided over whether to stay in the Union or join the Confederacy, Maryland, Delaware, Kentucky, and Missouri; these slave states stayed in the Union and were crucial to Lincoln's political and military strategy. He feared alienating them with emancipation of slaves and adding them to the Confederate cause.

Wilmot Proviso

(1846)- A proposal to outlaw slavery in the territory added to the United States by the Mexican Cession; passed in the House of Representatives but was defeated in the Senate

Fort Sumter

Federal fort in the harbor of Charleston, South Carolina; the Confederate attack on the fort marked the start of the Civil War., -firing began April 12, 1861

Abraham Lincoln

One of the most skillful politicians in the newly formed Republican party; a Lawyer. Tried to gain national exposure by debates with Stephen A. Douglas. The Lincoln-Douglas debates attracted much attention. Lincoln's attacks on slavery made him nationally known. He felt slavery was morally wrong but was not an abolitionist. He felt there was not an alternative to slavery and blacks were not prepared to live on equal terms as whites. Won presidency in November 1860 election. Saved the Union as president of the United States during the Civil War, Assassinated in 1865.

regional differences

Before the Civil War, the north had developed into a diverse industrial economy, while the south remained mostly agricultural. This created differences socially and economically

states' rights

Believed that because the states created the United States, individual states have the power to nullify federal laws. The idea that states can restrict federal authority.

States' rights have more restriction; Federal power gives more freedom.