Period 5 Key Terms

Reasons for westward migration (Manifest Destiny) - Access to natural and mineral resources, economic opportunities for settlers, religious refuge (Mormons).

Arguments to annex western lands included – Manifest Destiny and American institutions (democracy)

Impact US acquiring the Mexican Cession- Debates over the status of slavery (Wilmot Proviso), Native Americans, and Mexicans in the newly acquired land.

How did the government encourage westward migration?- Passing new legislation (think Homestead Act) encouraging settlers to move west, government gave land and subsidies to RR companies.

Goal of the Nativist Movement? - It was especially Anti-Catholic. The nativists hoped to limit the power and cultural influence of the immigrants (Irish and Germans).

What was the free soil movement? - Sought to keep slavery from expanding into newly acquired territories.

What were ways abolitionists campaigned against slavery? - Moral arguments (think William Lloyd Garrison), assisting slaves' escapes (think Underground RR), using violence (think Bleeding-Kansas and Harpers Ferry).

How did the South justify and defend slavery? – They claimed slavery was a positive good (John C. Calhoun).

What was the Compromise of 1850? - Dealt with the Mexican Cession - popular sovereignty would be used in the territory, slave trade was banned in Washington D.C., California was added as a free state, a more strict fugitive slave law was created.

What was the Kansas-Nebraska Act? - Overturned the MO Compromise - introduced popular sovereignty in Kansas and Nebraska. Helped lead to the creation of the Republican Party.

What did the Supreme Court rule in Dred Scott v. Sanford? – Slaves were property, not citizens; Congress could NOT legislate slavery in the territories.

What did Lincoln campaign on in the Election of 1860? – A free soil platform – non extension of slavery.

How did Lincoln’s views towards the war change over time? – Lincoln viewed the war initially as preserving the union, but eventually sought to end slavery -> Emancipation Proclamation and Gettysburg Address

How did the Union ultimately prevail in the Civil War? – Improvements in leadership and strategy (Grant and the “Anaconda Plan”), Key Victories – Gettysburg and Antietam; Greater resources – more factories and RRs, the South’s infrastructure was destroyed.

What did the 13 – 15 amendments do? – 13 – abolished slavery; 14 – granted citizenship and equal protection; 15 – universal adult male suffrage.

Why did the 15^th amendment split the women’s rights movement? – Some women advocated suffrage be extended to women as well as African American males.

Why did Reconstruction end? – Compromise of 1877 withdrew troops from the South; The North’s WANING resolve led to many in the North to no longer support Reconstruction.

What is sharecropping? – Renting of land to former slaves – limited economic opportunities to former slaves and poor whites in the south.

What were ways the South resisted the 14^th and 15^th amendments? – Segregation – Jim Crow laws; Violence – KKK and White League; Supreme Court Decisions – Plessy v. Ferguson (“Separate but equal”); Local political tactics – poll taxes, literacy tests, and grandfather clause