Know-Nothing Party (American Party)

• 1854-1856 - Held the greatest influence

• Were anti-Catholic + anti-immigration

• After the election of 1856, they became irrelevant

Webster-Ashburton Treaty

• 1824

• Defined the border between Canada and the US

• The two countries would share the Great Lakes + were divided by the 49th parallel

Wilmot Proviso

• 1846 - Failed to pass

• David Wilmot

• Held that any land annexed from the Mexican-American War would be closed to slavery

• Sectional voting led to the unification of Democrats + Whigs

Popular Sovereignty

• Lewis Cass

• People in territories would vote whether or not that state would have slavery

• Opposed by Abraham Lincoln + the Supreme Court in the Dred Scott court case

Gold Rush

• 1848 - Gold discovered in California

• 1849 - Influx of gold hunters, nicknamed the Forty-niners, traveled to the gold mines to try to get rich

  • Few ACTUALLY became rich

Compromise of 1850

• 1850

• Written by Henry Clay

• 5 separate laws

  • California is a free state

  • Popular sovereignty in the land annexed from Mexico

  • Left the option of legalizing slavery to the territories of New Mexico and Utah

  • Banned slave trading in Washington DC

  • Enforced the Fugitive Slave Law

Free Soil Party

• Formed in 1848

• Opposed the further spread of slavery into territories

• 1854 - Absorbed by Republican party

Stephen Douglas

• US Senator + served on the Committee on Territories

• Believed in popular sovereignty

• Wrote the Kansas-Nebraska Bill

• 1858 - Competed against Lincoln for Senate election

• 1860 - Competed against Lincoln for presidential election

Ostend Manifesto

• Written by Franklin Pierce + James Buchanan

• Offered Spain $100 mil to buy Cuba

• After Spain refused, the US took Cuba by force

Fugitive Slave Law

• 1850

• The big question: If the North wasn’t returning escaped slaves, was that violating the Bill of Rights?

• If judges returned escaped slaves to their owners, they received a reward

• Northern resistance to this law

Uncle Tom’s Cabin

• 1852

• Written by Harriet Beecher Stowe

• Harshly criticized in the South

• Emotional + stirred abolitionists in the North

• Laid the foundation for the Civil War

Nativism

• Opposed immigration, mostly from Southern + Eastern Europe

• Blamed the problems of overpopulation + urban sprawl on immigrants

• Practiced by the Know-Nothing Party + the KKK

Kansas-Nebraska Act

• 1854

• Stephen Douglas wanted land to build a transcontinental railroad

• Decided that people in Kansas + Nebraska would be able to vote on whether or not they wanted slavery

Republican Party

• 1854 - Formed modern Republican party

• Composed of Free Soil + Liberty Party + northern Whigs + northern anti-slavery Democrats

• Supported John C. Fremont in the election of 1856

John Brown

• Fought in Bleeding Kansas + Pottawatomie Massacre

• 1859 - After dying a hero in the Harpers Ferry Raid, he was seen as a martyr in the North

Bleeding Kansas

• 1854-1858

• Lecompton (pro-slavery) vs. Topeka (anti-slavery)

• The period of repeated outbreaks of violent guerrilla warfare between pro-slavery and anti-slavery forces following the creation of the new territory of Kansas in 1854

• Missourian border ruffians illegally voted for slavery

• 1861 - Kansas entered as free state

Brooks-Sumner Affair

• 1856

• Charles Sumner attacked slavery interests

• Preston Brooks beat Sumner with a cane

• This incident was praised in South + criticized in North

Lecompton Constitution

• 1857

• Pro-slavery gov’t supported by President Buchanan

• After the second vote, it was rejected

• Kansas entered as free state

Dred Scott Case

• 1857

• Dred Scott was a slave that lived in free territory

• Supreme Court decision stated that slaves weren’t citizens and couldn’t sue in federal courts + that the Missouri Compromise was unconstitutional

• Angered North

Lincoln-Douglas Debates

• 1858

• Abraham Lincoln vs. Stephen A. Douglas

• Freeport Doctrine would decide slavery or not for a state before entering Union + use force to maintain slavery

  • Split Democratic Party

• Made Lincoln nationally famous

Election of 1860

• 1860

• Stephen A. Douglas

• Abraham Lincoln’s campaign contained ideas of a railroad + Homestead Act + protective tariff + against slave trade & spread of slavery

• John C. Breckinridge was supported by Southern Democrats + supported slavery & states’ rights

• John Bell was backed by the Constitutional Union Party

• After Lincoln’s victory, the South seceded

Crittenden Compromise

• 1860

• John Crittenden

• Hoped to reestablish + extend 36-30 line (more land for slave territories)

• Lincoln believed that slavery shouldn’t expand into any further territories

• After it was rejected, it symbolized the end of the era of compromise

States’ Rights

• Confederate States of America

• Ruled by a weak central gov’t

• Led by John C. Calhoun

Secession

• 1860-1861

• The South believed they had the constitutional right to secede from Union

• Formed the Confederate States of America

BIG PICTURE

• Ability to compromise over slavery ↓

• Abolition - Literature, humanitarian reforms, events

• South defended slavery - Popular sovereignty + property rights

• Violence - Anti-slavery vs. pro-slavery

• Divisive events - Elected Abraham Lincoln + secession