AP United States History - Terms and People – Unit 6, Chapter 18 (12th Ed.)
HONOR PLEDGE: I strive to uphold the vision of the North Penn School District, which is to inspire each student to reach his or her highest potential
and become a responsible citizen. Therefore, on my honor, I pledge that I have neither given nor received unauthorized assistance on this work.
Renewing the Sectional Struggle: 1848 – 1854
Before studying Chapter 18, read over these “Themes”:
Theme: The sectional conflict over the expansion of slavery that erupted after the Mexican War was temporarily quieted
by the Compromise of 1850, but Douglass Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854 exploded it again.
Theme: In the 1850s American expansionism in the West and the Caribbean was extremely controversial because it
was tied to the slavery question.
After studying Chapter 18 in your textbook, you should be able to:
1. Explain how the issue of slavery in the territories acquired from Mexico disrupted American politics from
1848 to 1850.
2. Point out the major terms of the Compromise of 1850 and indicate how this agreement attempted to deal
with the issue of slavery.
3. Indicate how the Whig party disintegrated and disappeared because of its divisions over slavery.
4. Describe how the Pierce administration engaged in various pro-southern overseas and expansionist
ventures.
5. Describe Douglas’s Kansas-Nebraska Act, and explain why it stirred the sectional controversy to new
heights.
Know the following people and terms. Consider the historical significance of each term or person.
Also note the dates of the event if that is pertinent.
A. People
Lewis Cass
Stephen A. Douglas
Franklin Pierce
+John C. Calhoun (“The Great Nullifier”)
Winfield Scott
Martin Van Buren
Daniel Webster
Matthew C. Perry
Harriet Tubman
William H. Seward
James Gadsden
+Henry Clay (“The Great Compromiser”)
Millard Fillmore
B. Terms:
popular sovereignty
filibustering
Free Soil party
“conscience” Whigs
“personal liberty” laws
Underground Railroad
AP United States History - Terms and People – Unit 6, Chapter 18 (12th Ed.)
HONOR PLEDGE: I strive to uphold the vision of the North Penn School District, which is to inspire each student to reach his or her highest potential
and become a responsible citizen. Therefore, on my honor, I pledge that I have neither given nor received unauthorized assistance on this work.
*Compromise of 1850
“fire eaters”
Clayton-Bulwer Treaty
Ostend Manifesto
“higher laws”
*Kansas-Nebraska Act
Utah and New Mexico
Cuba
Nicaragua
California Gold Rush
“49er’s”
Fugitive Slave Law
“Black ships”
+=One of the 100 Most Influential Americans of All Time, as ranked by The Atlantic. Go to Webpage to see all 100.
*=A 100 Milestone Document from the National Archive. Go to Webpage to link to these documents.
C. Sample Essays: Using what you have previously learned and what you learned by
reading Chapter 18, you should be able to answer an essay such as this one:
1. Why were proslavery southerners so eager to push for further expansion in Nicaragua,
Cuba, and elsewhere in the 1850’s?
2. By the end of 1854, the North and the South had reached an impasse, making the Civil
War inevitable. Assess the validity of that statement.
D. Voices from the past:
I expose slavery in this country, because to expose it is to kill it. Slavery is one of those monsters of darkness to
whom the light of truth is death.
Frederick Douglass
In one of the books written about her during her lifetime, Harriet Tubman told about her feelings
in 1849 as she crossed the border between Maryland (where she was a slave) and free Pennsylvania:
“I looked at my hands to see if I was the same person now I was free. There was such a glory through the trees and
over the fields, and I felt like I was in heaven.”
E. Compromise of 1850: Concessions were made to both the North and South. List the three major
concessions made to each side.
Concessions to the North
Concessions to the South
1. ____________________________
1. ________________________________
____________________________
________________________________
____________________________
________________________________
2. _____________________________
_____________________________
_____________________________
2. ________________________________
________________________________
________________________________
3. _____________________________
_____________________________
_____________________________
3. ________________________________
________________________________
________________________________
Who proposed the Compromise of 1850? ____________________________ (See your Chapter 17 Terms
and Objectives for a brief biography of him.)
AP United States History - Terms and People – Unit 6, Chapter 18 (12th Ed.)
HONOR PLEDGE: I strive to uphold the vision of the North Penn School District, which is to inspire each student to reach his or her highest potential
and become a responsible citizen. Therefore, on my honor, I pledge that I have neither given nor received unauthorized assistance on this work.
F. Map Work: Identify the places indicated by the reference numbers on the map below.
_____ Nashville, Tennessee
_____ Gadsden Purchase
_____ Kansas Territory
_____ California
_____ Washington, D.C.
_____ Nebraska Territory
_____ Utah Territory
_____ Oregon Territory
_____ Minnesota Territory
Label the following places on the map:
Pennsylvania
Texas
New York
Virginia
Missouri
G. How did Japan react to the arrival of Commodore Mathew Perry? Turn the page to find out:
AP United States History - Terms and People – Unit 6, Chapter 18 (12th Ed.)
HONOR PLEDGE: I strive to uphold the vision of the North Penn School District, which is to inspire each student to reach his or her highest potential
and become a responsible citizen. Therefore, on my honor, I pledge that I have neither given nor received unauthorized assistance on this work.
The arrival of Commodore Mathew Perry in Japan
“. . . on Friday, July 8, 1853, four U.S. Navy ships bristling with civilization and sixty-one state-of-the-art
cannon entered Tokyo Bay. Atop their masts flew the American flag, with thirty-one starts on blue field.
Martians landing in spaceships with gamma-ray guns would not have caused more of an uproar.
Fishermen in the bay were the first to behold the huge, noisy, black-cloud-belching monsters. These
men were not even aware of the existence of steam engines and suddenly they were in front of them – giant
dragons puffing smoke! A general alarm spread across the land. Temple bells rang as fleet-footed messengers
spread out to warn that ‘the Black Ships of the Evil Men’ had descended on the land of the gods.
The story grew as it spread. The word was that ‘one hundred thousand devils with white faces’ were
about to overrun the country. The world’s largest city [Edo, later called Tokyo] lay defenseless before alien
guns. People panicked. Families ran from their homes with their valuables on their backs. Japanese
newspaper artists sailed out to make sketches of the strange ship and their gaizan [foreigner]. Readers
scooped up special editions with pictures of the ‘hairy barbarians’ and their machines. Samurai who had never
dressed for warfare worked to scrape rust from their spears. Throngs packed the schrines and temples praying
to the gods for deliverance. People trembled and beseeched the gods to once again blow the gaizan away with
another kamikaze [god winds].”
Excerpted from Flyboys, by James Bradley (2003)
Commodore Perry's fleet (Japanese print)