Unit 5 Vocabulary (Chapters 13-15) part 1
1. Manifest Destiny: manifest destiny reflected both the burgeoning pride that characterized American Nationalism in the mid-19th century and the idealistic vision of perfection that was around at the time. It rested on the idea that America was destined by God to expand coast to coast; phrase first coined by John O'Sullivan; Sign: major justification of Mex.-Amer. War and indirectly helped bring about the Civil War
2. Expansionism: reflected the idea of American expanding is root to include all the space possible for its democracy to spread. It was a belief that meant Mexicans and Indians were inferior and should be pushed out of the way; Americans did not view this as imperial behavior
3. Stephen Austin: established 1st legal American settlement in TX in 1820. Austin and his followers wanted more autonomy within Mexico, but with Santa Anna ruling Mexico, Austin and his followers decided to fight for independence; sign.: helped bring about indep. for Texas
4. Oregon Country: included all of the territory from the present So. boundary of
Oregon to the present southern boundary of Alaska at 54'40°; Both Britain and US claimed it. "Joint Occupation" between British and US lasted for 20yrs. The issue was finally resolved with Polk, and the territory was divided at the 49th parallel, with the US getting everything south of that parallel; Sign.: set present day boundary betw. Canada and US and helped keep the US out of a war with Britain just before going to war with Mexico
5. Joint Occupation: a treaty in 1818 that allowed the citizens of England and the US
equal access to Oregon territory. This arrangement was known as the "joint occupation" and lasted for over 20 years.
6. James Polk: most people considered the '44 election to have been a battle
between Clay and Van Buren, instead Polk got the Democratic nomination as a "dark horse" candidate; He had a clear objective in expansion. He combined the OR and TX issues into one. He beat Clay who was trying to side-straddle the issues. Polk led America into the Mexican-American War, and solved the OR issue with Britain; Sign.: expanded U.S. territory more than any other President besides Thomas Jefferson
7. Rio Grande/Nueces River: TX claimed that after it won its independence from
Mexico, that their border stretched down to the Rio Grande. The Mexicans said that the border was at the Nueces River. Polk agreed with the Texans and sent Zach Taylor to cross the Nueces River and approach the Rio Grande. The Mexicans soon attacked and the war began; Sign.: started Mex.-Amer. War 8. John Slidell: sent by Polk to try to purchase Calif. from Mex.;) but the Mexicans wouldn't sell it to the Americans for any price.
9. Treaty of Guadeloupe-Hidalgo: the treaty (1848) that ended the Mexican-
American war in 1848. America got all the disputed territory including all of the present day west. But American also took over the debts to Mexican citizens living in the territory and paid Mexico $15 Million; guaranteed rights of Mexicans as citizens of the U.S., but these rights were usually denied 10. Wilmot-Proviso: was proposed by David Wilmot in 1846?, and it would have
barred slavery in territory acquired from Mexico. It passed in House but failed in
the Senate, and would resurface for years afterwards; Sign.: made the South feel that the North was intent on destroying slavery by gaining total dominance in the Senate, the House, and thus, the Electoral College and Supreme Court
11. "Popular Sovereignty": was first known as "squatter sovereignty", which would
allow for people of each state (through legislature) to decide the status of slavery in the territory; first proposed by Sen. Cass from Michigan in 1848, but later became the key project of Stephen Douglas in the Kansas Nebraska Act of 1854; sign.: helped bring about the troubles in Kansas because the policy was vague as to who could vote and when the voting would take place
12. Compromise of 1850: Clay spearheaded effort to compromise on the slavery
issue, But after the Triumvirate had spoken, a second phase in negotiation took over, in which the youngster took charge. Douglas broke Clay's proposal down into 8 parts, each of which passed separately. It cooled sectional conflict for a 19 time. Its provisions included:
CA be admitted as free state
in the rest of the lands acquired from Mexico, territorial governments by pop. Sovereignty in Ut. And New Mex.
TX yield in boundary dispute with NM
slave trade, but not slavery itself, be abolished in DC
stringent fugitive slave law in
Sign.: helped stave off Civil War for 10 years which helped the North increase its advantage over the South in population, manufacturing and other key areas; last great compromise to preserve the Union; ultimately, it failed
13. Stephen Douglas: was the most important man in getting the passage of the
Compromise of 1850, he was 37 years old at the time, and a Democratic Senator from IL. He was committed to sectional and personal gain. He broke down Clay's proposal and made it into 8 separate bills which finally passed. Eventually, bill Improposed the Kansas-Nebr. Act of 1854; ran against Lincoln for Sen. In 1858 and against Lincoln, Breckinridge and Bell for Pres. in 1860; supported Lincoln during the Civil War until his death
14. Free Soil Party: Anti-Slavery Northerners who were gaining popular support in
the 1840's Divisions in the Whig party allowed for them to gain in numbers as well. They repudiated Compromise of 1850. They were against slavery in the new territories because they wanted nothing to do w/blacks, and wanted America to be reserved only for whites to be independent farmers and free labor workers; Sign.: forerunner of the Rep. Party; helped Northern Whigs to attack the expansion of slavery
15. Fugitive Slave Act: was part of the compromise of 1850. Blacks accused of being runaways had no right to a trial or a jury, or even to plead their case. Judges would turn slaves over on simple affidavits, and were paid more for returning an alleged slave, then they were in declaring them free. Northern hostility to such increased dramatically. In Wisconsin, it was declared void; Sign.: helped bring support to Northern abolitionists and helped start Civil War
16. Ostend Manifesto: Pierce had been secretly trying to buy Cuba from Spain for
quite some time. Then a letter came from one of his commissioners in Ostend, Belgium, which proposed to take Cuba by force. It leaked out to the public, and became a huge controversy. No. Antislavery defenders accused the South and Pierce of conspiring to bring in another slave state; made Northerners more convinced there was a slave conspiracy to control the US government
17. Bleeding KS: after 1,000 of MO people crossed the border to vote in KS to
ensure it would become a slave state, anti and pro slavery people were at each others throats. Both claimed governments in KS. Antislavery leader established a capital at Lawrence, and the proslaveryites destroyed it; many believed the violence in Kansas helped to bring on the Civil War
18. John Brown.: was a fiercely committed abolitionist. He gathered 6 followers and
murdered 5 pro slaveryites in KS. He then gathered more people and took Harper's Ferry, but was forced out by federal troops. He was hung by US officials and became an over night martyr. His raid convinced the South that they could no longer live peacefully within the Union and convinced many Northerners that only violence could eliminate the evils of slavery
19. Charles Sumner: was a MA senator, who rose and gave a great speech in front of
congress in which he insulted a SC senator, Andrew Butler. Butler's cousin, Brooks, then beat Sumner w/ a cane. Sumner was out for years from office, and Brooks was removed from office. Sumner became a hero to the N. and Brooks to the South; helped convince both sections, that the other section was barbarous and could not be trusted
20. "Slave Power Conspiracy": northern free laborites maintained that the south was involved in a conspiracy to spread slavery further. Something they believed threatened the future of every white laborer and property owner in the north; northerners felt that powerful slave owners were trying to gain control of all aspects of the national government-House, Senate, Presidency and Sup. Court
21. Republican Party: formed in 1854, from remnants of the Whig, Liberty and
Know-Nothing parties; the ideology of preserving free labor was a the heart of the Republican Party They considered slavery a threat to white labor and to individual opportunity. Continued growth and progress was central to the free labor vision; they also wanted higher tariffs, cheap land made available to settlers in the West, and a transcontinental railroad; To republicans, prospect of dismemberment of the union was unthinkable.
22. Freeport Doctrine: in the congressional debates between Lincoln and Douglas in
1858, Lincoln asked Douglas whether a territory could exclude slavery prior to the formation of a constitution. Douglas said that if the people didn't draft any laws legalizing slavery in that territory, then slavery could not exist. His response became known as the Freeport Doctrine, or the Freeport Heresy in the South. While it won him the election to the senate in IL, it destroyed his Presidential ambitions by alienating the South.
23. Gag Rule: southern U.S. Representatives managed for a time to impose a gag rule (adopted in 1836 and repudiated in 1844) in which congress would table all anti- slavery petitions w/o being read; Sign.: showed the extremes So. would attempt to stop debate on slavery; J.Q. Adams helped fight battle to get rid of gag rule
24. Buchanan: was a democratic president in 1856; He supported the pro-slaveryites
in Kansas by favoring statehood based on the Lecompton Const.; did not believe So. states had right to secede, but also, believed that he had the Constitutional power to stop them from secedeing
25. Dred Scott V.S. Stanford: Dred Scott was the property of an army surgeon in MO. He traveled w/ his master to IL, where slavery was Illegal, and soon his owner died. He sued for freedom at the municipal level and got it. But his owner's brother appealed to state supreme court and won. The issue became key S.C. by decision in 1857 when Chief Justice Taney ruled in Dred Scott case 1.) that no Afr.-American had rights to sue in federal courts, 2.) slaves were property and could be taken to any terr.; 3.) neither Congress nor terr. legislatures had right to huwt prohibit slavery since this infringed on 5th amendement rights; 4.) invalidated the
Mo. Compromise, Kansas-Nebr. Act and the N.W. Ordinance of 1787; Sign. It was a major blow to the anti-slavery movement. It basically nullified the MO Compromise by stating that people can take their "property" with them wherever they want. Helped convince Northerners of a slave conspiracy to control fedl. Govt.
26. Lecompton Constitution: was a proslavery constitution drawn up in KS, but it
was then rejected by the KS people. The constitution was resubmitted but failed again, so KS wasn't allowed in as a state until 1861.
27. Lincoln: introduced spot resolutions against the Mex. War in 1846 and 1847; a member of the Whig Party and eventually joined the Rep. Party; emerged after famous debates w/Douglas in the national limelight. He believed that slavery was morally wrong, but was not an abolitionist. When he won the presidential election in 1860, SC immediately seceded; led the North against the So. to preserve the Union and in 1863 issued Emancipation Proclamation; assassinated in 1865 shortly after 2nd Inaguaral Address and after Lee's surrender;
28. Fort Sumter: a federal fort off of the SC coastline in Charleston Harbor; when SC
left union, Confederates didn't have enough power to take that fort. Lincoln sent a relief mission to the island, but SC fired on the ship and fort, and took the island. The first shots of the civil war.