The Union in Peril
1848-1861
UNIT 5
CH.13
Main Causes of Conflict
 Slavery
 Constitutional disputes
 Economic differences
 Political blunders and extremism
 Compromise of 1820 made a balance of 15 slave and
15 free states

What breaks it?
Conflict over Territories
 Free-Soil Movement
 Wanted to keep the west for whites only so they would not
have to compete for land and jobs
 “free soil, free labor, and free men”
 Whigs who opposed slavery and antislavery Democrats
 Southern Position
 Any attempt to restrict slavery was a violation of constitutional
rights
 Popular Sovereignty
 Democratic senator Lewis Cass proposed that all new states
vote on whether they want slavery
Election of 1848
 Democrats nominate Lewis Cass
 Campaigned on platform of popular sovereignty
 Whigs nominate General Zachary Taylor
 Took no position on slavery
 Free-Soilers nominate former president Martin Van
Buren

Antislavery
 Taylor won the election
Compromise of 1850
 Henry Clay’s proposal
 Admit California as a free state
 Divide the remainder of the territory into two territories and
allow popular sovereignty
 Disputed land to new territories; gov will assume Texas debt
 Slave trade banned in DC
 New fugitive slave law
 Arguments for and against
 Webster says compromise and save the union
 Calhoun says don’t compromise and give the south equal rights
in the new territories
 President Taylor opposed Clay’s plan
Compromise of 1850
 Stephen Douglas and ratification
 President Millard Fillmore supported compromise
 Douglas passed each part of the compromise separately
through congress
 no major slavery issues until 1854
Agitation over Slavery
 Fugitive Slave law
 Fugitive slaves could be tracked down in the North and taken
back to the South
 Enforcement of the law added to feelings of bitterness
 Underground Railroad
 A series of houses or other places to hide slaves on their
journey north
 Harriet Tubman, an escaped slave, went to the South at least
19 times to help escaped slaves
Agitation over Slavery
 Literature on Slavery
 North- Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin (1852) was
the most influential book of its day
 South- George Fitzhugh’s Sociology for the South (1854) and
Cannibals All! (1857)- capitalism was worse than slavery, no
equal rights for “unequal” men
 South- Hinton R. Helper’s Impending Crisis of the South; used
statistics to demonstrate slavery’s negative impact on the
southern economy
 South was convinced more than ever that the North
wanted to end slavery and destroy the southern way
of life
National Parties in Crisis
 Election of 1852
 Whigs nominated General Winfield Scott
 Campaign ignored slavery and instead focused on improving
roads and harbors
 Democrats nominated Franklin Pierce
 Supported Fugitive slave law
Kansas-Nebraska Act
 Stephen A. Douglas wanted a railroad to go through
Chicago to support Western settlement

He owned land there
 To win southern approval, he proposed Nebraska be
divided into two territories
 Kansas and Nebraska could decide slavery with
popular sovereignty
 The bill passed and tensions over slavery were
renewed
New Parties
 Know-Nothing Party
 Grew out of opposition to immigrant German and Irish
Catholics (this became their main issue)
 Won a few state and local elections; weakened the Whigs
 Republican Party
 Founded in direct response to K-N Act
 Northern and Western moderates
 Would let slavery continue as long as it was confined to states
in which it already existed
Election of 1856
 Republican-:John C. Fremont
 No expansion of slavery
 free homesteads
 Protective tariff
 Democrats: James Buchannan
 Not tainted by K-N Act
 Know-Nothing: Millard Fillmore
 Democrats won
Extremists and Violence
 “Bleeding Kansas”
 Slave holders from Missouri set up homesteads in Kansas
 Know-Nothings organize New England Emigrant Aid
Company to pay for transportation of antislavery settlers
 Fighting breaks out between pro and anti slavery advocates
 Free-soil killings
 1856 Lawrence, KS (free-soil) is attacked and 2 are killed
 John Brown (radical abolitionist) retaliates by attacking the
proslavery settlement of Pottawatomie Creek and killing 5
settlers
 Pierce administration does nothing
Extremists and Violence
 Caning of Sumner
 Mass Senator Charles Sumner verbally attacked the Pierce
administration over the violence in Kansas


included personal attacks on a S.C. senator, Andrew Butler
Butler’s nephew, Congressman Preston Brooks beat Sumner
with his cane until it broke
Constitutional Issues
 Lecompton Constitution



Proslavery constitution submitted by Kansas
Buchanan asked Congress to accept the document even though it was
clear it did not have majority support in Kansas
Congress rejected it.
 Dred Scott v. Sandford (1857)


Overturned Missouri Compromise of 1820
Scott was not a citizen and had no right to bring suit
 Lincoln-Douglas Debates


Stephen Douglas won reelection but alienated southern Democrats
Abraham Lincoln won national recognition and became a leading
contender for the 1860 Republican presidential nomination
Road to Secession
 John Brown’s Raid at Harper's Ferry
 Attacked a federal arsenal in an attempt to arm slaves to start a
rebellion in Virginia
 Brown and six of his followers were tried and hanged
 Election of 1860
 Breakup of Democratic party
Northern Dems- Stephen Douglas
 Southern Dems- John C. Breckinridge




Republicans nominate Lincoln
Constitutional Union party nominates John Bell
Election results- Lincoln wins
Secession of the Deep South
 Special Convention
 Dec. 1860; South Carolina votes to leave the union; followed by
Florida, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Texas
 Feb 1861- Montgomery, AL; Confederate States of America
formed
 Crittenden Compromise
 Buchanan let the seven states go without a fight
 Senator John Crittenden proposes a constitutional
amendment that would uphold the Missouri Compromise

This effort fails