Sectionalism to Separatism
United states or united States?
• 1800
cotton gin- makes plantation
production of cotton practical. Cotton production
becomes “industrialized;” massive work force is
needed.
• 1820
Missouri Compromise- Maine (free
state) and Missouri (slave state) enter the Union
to balance the Senate. No more slave states
north of Missouri’s southern border.
• 1830-50’s
Abolitionism- Slavery is
morally wrong, slavery is an attack upon a
free labor market.
• 1846-48
Mexican War- US adds huge
new territories: Slave states or free
states? Both cultures/economies of North
and South want to control the new
territories.
• 1850
Compromise of 1850- CA is a free
state, NM by “popular soereignty; DC pop sov;
no slave trade; Fugitive Slave law- penalize
those who harbor slaves.
• 1856
Kansas Nebraska Act- slavery here
would be decided by popular sovereignty. Did
away with Missouri Compromise. Supported in
the South, not in the North.
• 1857
Depression- Unemployment;
resentment against cheap labor (immigrant and
slave); high tarriff pressure. N-yes, S-no.
• 1858 Bleeding Kansas- Guerilla
warfare between pro-slave and anti-slave
settlers over “Popular Sovereignty” in
Kansas.
• 1859 John Brown- Radical Abolitionist
leads a raid on U.S. government army
base in VA to instigate a slave rebellion.
Brown is hero in North; prophet of the
future to the south.
• 1860 Lincoln- Republican; aggressive
enemy of the expansion of slavery into
new states; is elected president without
any votes from the south; politics is
completely sectionalized.
• 1861 Secession- Southern states
rebel; South claims states created
Constitution, they therefore can dissolve it
(nullification).