Chapter 12 – The North
Section Notes
The Industrial Revolution
in America
Changes in Working Life
The Transportation Revolution
More Technological Advances
History Close-up
A Mill Girl
Quick Facts
Chapter 12 Visual Summary
Video
Mass Transportation
Maps
Transportation Routes, 1850
Images
Textile Mill and Water Frame
Mississippi River Steamboats
The Steam Train
Samuel Morse
The Industrial Revolution in America
The Big Idea
The Industrial Revolution transformed the way goods were
produced in the United States.
Main Ideas
• The invention of new machines in Great Britain led to the
beginning of the Industrial Revolution.
• The development of new machines and processes brought
the Industrial Revolution to the United States.
• Despite a slow start in manufacturing, the United States
made rapid improvements during the War of 1812.
Textile Industry
• The first breakthrough in the Industrial Revolution was in how
textiles, or cloth goods, were made.
• Richard Arkwright, an Englishman, invented a spinning machine
in 1769 called the water frame, which replaced hand spinning.
• The water frame used flowing water as a source of power.
– Could produce dozens of cotton threads at the same time
– Lowered the cost of cotton production and increased the speed
of textile production
• Merchants built textile mills near rivers and streams.
• Great Britain soon built the world’s most productive textile
manufacturing industry.
Manufacturing Breakthroughs
• U.S. factories needed better technology, or tools, to
manufacture muskets.
• Inventor Eli Whitney developed musket factories using
water-powered machinery.
• Whitney introduced the idea of interchangeable parts,
or parts of a machine that are identical, to make musket
manufacturing easier.
• Interchangeable parts sped up the process of mass
production.
Main Idea 3:
Despite a slow start in manufacturing, the
United States made rapid improvements
during the War of 1812.
• Lower British prices on manufactured goods made it
difficult for American manufacturing to grow.
• American manufacturing was limited to cotton goods, flour
milling, weapons, and iron products.
• The War of 1812 cut off trade with Great Britain, allowing
manufacturing in the United States to prosper and
expand.
• Changes were needed to manufacturing because demand
for goods was greater than the available supply.
Changes in Working Life
The Big Idea
The introduction of factories changed working
life for many Americans.
Main Ideas
• The spread of mills in the Northeast changed workers’
lives.
• The Lowell system revolutionized the textile industry in
the Northeast.
• Workers organized to reform working conditions.
Main Idea 1:
The spread of mills in the Northeast changed
workers’ lives.
• Factory jobs usually involved simple, repetitive tasks done
for low pay.
– Could not find workers because of the simple work and
the fact that other jobs were available
• The mill industry filled jobs by hiring whole families, and
paying children low wages.
– Built housing for workers and provided a company store
• Samuel Slater’s strategy of hiring families and dividing
factory work into simple tasks was called the Rhode
Island system.
Main Idea 2:
The Lowell System revolutionized the textile
industry in the Northeast.
• Francis Cabot Lowell created a new system of mill
manufacturing in 1814, called the Lowell system.
• The Lowell system involved
– Employing young, unmarried women, who were housed in
boardinghouses
– Providing clean factories and free-time activities for its employees
– Having mills that included both spinning thread and weaving in the
same plant
– More women became mill workers because of the opportunity to earn
better wages than most available jobs.
Main Idea 3:
Workers organized to reform working
conditions.
Deteriorating Working
Conditions
• Employees worked 12-to14 hour days in unhealthy
conditions.
• Craftsmen’s wages dropped
in competition against
cheap manufactured goods.
• Wages of factory workers
dropped as they competed
for jobs.
Trade Unions Formed
• Craftsmen formed trade unions
to gain higher wages and better
working conditions.
• Factory workers also formed trade
unions.
• Labor unions staged protests
called strikes, refusing to work
until employers met their
demands.
• Most early strikes were
unsuccessful because the courts
and police did not take the side of
the workers
The Transportation Revolution
The Big Idea
New forms of transportation improved business, travel, and
communications in the United States.
Main Ideas
• The Transportation Revolution affected trade and daily life.
• The steamboat was one of the first developments of the
Transportation Revolution.
• Railroads were a vital part of the Transportation
Revolution.
• The Transportation Revolution brought many changes to
American life and industry.
Main Idea 1:
The Transportation Revolution affected
trade and daily life.
• The 1800s gave rise to Transportation Revolution:
period of rapid growth in new means of transportation
• Transportation Revolution created boom in business and
trade by enabling goods to travel quickly across the U.S.
• Two new forms of transportation were steamboat and
steam-powered trains
– Goods, people, and information were able to travel
rapidly and efficiently across the United States.
Main Idea 2:
The steamboat was one of
the first developments of the
Transportation Revolution.
• Robert Fulton invented the steamboat, testing the Clermont in
1807.
• Steamboats increased trade by moving goods more quickly and
more cheaply.
• More than 500 steamboats were in use by 1840.
• Gibbons v. Ogden (1824): The Supreme Court reinforced the
federal government’s authority to regulate trade between states.
– Gibbons argued that a federal license meant he could use New
York waterways without another license.
– The Supreme Court agreed with Gibbons.
Main Idea 4:
The Transportation Revolution brought many
changes to American life and industry.
• People in all areas of the nation had access to products
made and grown far away.
• Railroads contributed to the expansion of the nation’s
borders.
• Cities and towns grew up along railroad tracks.
• The farming industry grew in the Midwest when settlers
began plowing up prairies and cutting down trees to make
farmland
Impact of Railroads
• Coal replaced wood as a source of fuel as trains grew
bigger.
• Railroads helped create the coal industry.
• Coal, shipped cheaply on trains, became the main fuel in
homes and in the emerging steel industry.
• Railroads helped the lumber industry grow, leading to
large-scale deforestation.
• Railroads caused cities to grow, including Chicago, which
became a transportation hub.
More Technological Advances
The Big Idea
Advances in technology led to new inventions that continued
to change daily life and work.
Main Ideas
• The telegraph made swift communication possible from
coast to coast.
• With the shift to steam power, businesses built new
factories closer to cities and transportation centers.
• Improved farm equipment and other labor-saving devices
made life easier for many Americans.
• New inventions changed lives in American homes.
Main Idea 1:
The telegraph made swift communication
possible from coast to coast.
• In 1832, Samuel F. B. Morse perfected the telegraph—a device
that could send information over wires.
– The device did not catch on until the 1844 Democratic National
Convention, when the nomination was telegraphed to
Washington.
• A Morse associate created Morse code to communicate
messages over the wires.
– Morse code turned pulses of electric current into long and short
clicks, also called dots and dashes, were arranged in patterns
representing letters of the alphabet.
• The telegraph was significant because it allowed people to send
news quickly from coast to coast
• The telegraph grew with the railroad; the first transcontinental
railroad line was completed in 1861.
Main Idea 2:
With the shift to steam power, businesses
built new factories closer to cities and
transportation centers.
• The shift from water power to steam power allowed
owners to build factories anywhere.
• Factories were shifted closer to cities and transportation
centers.
• Cities became centers of industrial growth.
Main Idea 3:
Improved farm equipment and other
labor-saving devices made life easier
for many Americans.
• John Deere designed a steel plow in 1837 that replaced
the less efficient iron plow.
• Cyrus McCormick developed a mechanical reaper in
1831, which quickly and efficiently harvested wheat.
– McCormick used a new method to encourage sales,
advertising.
– He also allowed people to buy on credit and provided
repairs and spare parts for his machines.
• These inventions allowed farmers to plant and harvest
huge crop fields, helping the country prosper.
Main Idea 4:
New inventions changed lives
in American homes.
• The sewing machine, invented by Elias Howe and
improved by Isaac Singer, made home sewing easier.
• Ice boxes and iron cookstoves improved household
storage and preparation of food.
• Mass-produced goods, such as clocks, matches, and safety
pins, added convenience to households.
Chapter 13 – The South
Section Notes
Growth of the Cotton Industry
Southern Society
The Slave System
History Close-up
Southern Plantation
Quick Facts
Chapter 13 Visual Summary
Video
Regional Economies
Maps
The Cotton Kingdom
Nat Turner’s Rebellion
Images
Cotton Gin
The South’s Cotton
Economy
A Slave’s Daily Life
Growth of the Cotton Industry
The Big Idea
The invention of the cotton gin made the South a one-crop
economy and increased the need for slave labor.
Main Ideas
• The invention of the cotton gin revived the economy of the
South.
• The cotton gin created a cotton boom in which farmers
grew little else.
• Some people encouraged southerners to focus on other
crops and industries.
Main Idea 1:
The invention of the cotton gin
revived the economy of the South.
• Prices for major southern crops—tobacco, rice, and indigo—fell after the
American Revolution.
• Cotton was not profitable, because of the difficulty of removing seeds.
• Demand for American cotton grew rapidly with the rise of British textile
mills.
• Eli Whitney patented the cotton gin, a machine to remove seeds from
cotton, in 1793.
• Planters—large-scale farmers—soon adopted the cotton gin and were
able to process tons of cotton much faster than hand processing.
• A healthy cotton crop could now guarantee financial success because of
high demand.
• Eli Whitney tried to influence Americans to try his inventions because of
their benefits in articles and papers, such as Technology in America
Main Idea 2:
The cotton gin created a cotton boom in
which farmers grew little else.
• Cotton gin made cotton so profitable that southern
farmers abandoned other crops.
• Removal of Native Americans opened up more land for
cotton farmers in Southeast.
• Development of new types of cotton helped spread
production throughout South, stretching from South
Carolina toTexas.
– This area became known as the cotton belt.
– United States produced more than half the cotton
grown in the world by 1840.
• Economic boom attracted new settlers, built up wealth
among white southerners, and firmly established slavery
in the South.
Cotton Belt
Cotton had many advantages as cash crop: inexpensive to
market and easy to store and transport.
Cotton had major disadvantage—used up nutrients in soil—so
farmers began crop rotation.
Farmers developed stronger types of cotton through
crossbreeding, which expanded the cotton industry.
Cotton industry was labor intensive; need for more slaves
caused increase in internal slave trade. Instead of paying free
workers, planters used enslaved Africans. In the first half of
the 1800’s 1/3 (one-third) of white southern families had
slaves.
Cotton Trade
• Southern cotton was used to make cloth in England and
the North.
• Great Britain became the South’s most valued foreign
trading partner.
• Increased trade led to the growth of port cities, including
Charleston, Savannah, and New Orleans.
• Crop brokers, called factors, managed the cotton trade.
Main Idea 3:
Some people encouraged southerners to
focus on other crops and industries.
Agriculture
• Corn—primary food crop.
• Other food crops—rice, sweet
potatoes, wheat, and
sugarcane.
• Tobacco production increased
when a slave developed an
improved drying process.
• Hemp and flax also became
cash crops.
• As long as agriculture profits
remained high, investors
preferred to invest in land.
Industry
• Factories in South built to serve
farmers’ needs.
• Nation’s first steam-powered
sawmill built in Louisiana in
1803.
• Entrepreneurs began investing
in cotton mills by 1840s.
• Tredegar Iron Works: one of
nation’s most productive iron
works.
• Industry remained a small part
of southern economy.
Southern Society
The Big Idea
Southern society centered around agriculture.
Main Ideas
• Southern society and culture consisted of four main
groups.
• Free African Americans in the South faced a great deal of
discrimination.
Main Idea 1:
Southern society and culture
consisted of four main groups.
• Only a third of white southern families had slaves; fewer
families had plantations.
• Planters had a powerful influence over the South.
• Other social groups included yeoman farmers, poor
whites, slaves, and free African Americans.
White Social Groups in the South
Planters
• Wealthiest
members of
society
• Males concerned
with crops and
slave laborers
• Planters’ wives
raised children,
ran households,
and saw to social
duties.
• Marriages were
often arranged.
Yeomen
• Yeomen were
owners of small
farms averaging
100 acres.
• Comprised
ofmostly white
southerners
• Families worked
long hours.
• Some yeomen
owned slaves.
• Took great pride
in their work
Poor Whites
• Often lived on
land that could
not grow crops
• Survived by
hunting, fishing,
raising small
gardens, and
doing odd jobs
A Southern Plantation
• Plantation House
– Planter and his family lived here
• Slave Cabins
– Slaves lived, crowded into small cabins
• Cotton-Ginning Shed
– Vital machines housed in shed to protect them from the
weather
• Other Buildings
– Overseer’s house, barn, smokehouse, stable
Other Aspects of Southern Society
Religion
• Most white southerners shared similar religious beliefs.
• Families often saw neighbors only at church events.
• Wealthy white southerners thought that religion justified their
place in society and the institution of slavery.
Urban Life
• Many southern cities were on the Atlantic Coast and began as
shipping centers.
• City governments built water systems and maintained streets.
Some provided public education.
• Slaves did much of the work in southern cities.
Main Idea 2:
Free African Americans in the South faced a
great deal of discrimination.
More than 250,000 free African Americans lived in the South in
1860, in both urban and rural areas.
Most worked as paid laborers on farms; those in cities worked a
variety of jobs.
Many governments passed laws limiting the rights of free
African Americans—they could not vote, travel freely, or hold
certain jobs. Some required that African Americans have a
white person represent them in business transactions.
Many white southerners argued that free African Americans did
not have the ability to take care of themselves.
The Slave System
The Big Idea
The slave system in the South produced harsh living
conditions and occasional rebellions.
Main Ideas
• Slaves worked at a variety of jobs on plantations.
• Life under slavery was difficult and dehumanizing.
• Slave culture centered around family, community, and
religion.
• Slave uprisings led to stricter slave codes in many states.
Main Idea 1:
Slaves worked at a variety of jobs
on plantations.
• Most enslaved African Americans lived in rural areas and
worked on farms and plantations.
• Most worked in the fields, where plantation owners used
the gang-labor system.
– All field hands worked on the same task at the same
time.
• Men, women, and children older than 10 were forced to do
the same work from sunup to sundown with little concern
for sickness and poor weather.
Other Types of Work Done by Slaves
• Some slaves worked as butlers, cooks, or nurses in
planter’s house.
• They often had better food, clothing, and shelter than field
hands but usually had to work longer hours.
• Some worked skilled jobs, such as blacksmithing or
carpentry.
• Some slaveholders let their slaves sell their labor to other
people.
• Some skilled slaves earned enough money this way to buy
their freedom.
Main Idea 2:
Life under slavery was difficult and
dehumanizing.
Slaveholders viewed slaves as property, not people. Slaves could be
sold at auction, with families often separated with little hope of reunion.
Slave traders sometimes kidnapped free African Americans and sold
them into slavery.
Enslaved people often endured poor living conditions, such as dirt-floor
cabins, cheap, coarse clothing, and small food rations.
Some planters used punishment to encourage slaves’ obedience. They
used irons and chains, stocks, and whips to punish slaves and also
passed strict slave codes to prohibit movement.
Main Idea 3:
Slave culture centered around family,
community, and religion.
• Family was the most important aspect of slave communities.
• Slave parents passed down family histories and African cultures
and traditions.
• Slaves told folktales to teach lessons about how to survive under
slavery.
• Religion played an important part in slave culture.
– By the early 1800s many slaves were Christians.
– They believed they were like the Hebrew slaves in ancient
Egypt and would someday have freedom.
– Some slaves sang spirituals to express religious beliefs.
• Slaves attempted to rebel in many ways, including holding their
own religious beliefs, slowing down work, and planning escapes.
Main Idea 4:
Slave uprisings led to stricter slave codes in
many states.
• White southerners lived in fear of slave revolts, which were
relatively rare.
• Nat Turner’s Rebellion was the most violent slave revolt.
– In 1831 Nat Turner, a slave, led a group of slaves in a plan to
kill all slaveholders in the county, killing about 60 white
people.
– More than 100 innocent slaves were killed in an attempt to
stop the rebellion.
– Turner was captured and executed.
• Many states toughened or strengthened slave codes, placing
stricter controls on the slave population as a result.
Chapter 14 – New Movements in America
Section Notes
Immigrants and Urban Challenges
American Arts
Reforming Society
The Movement to End Slavery
Women’s Rights
History Close-up
New York City, mid-1800s
Quick Facts
Push-Pull Factors of
Immigration
Chapter 14 Visual Summary
Video
Individual Rights and
Beliefs
Maps
The Underground Railroad
Images
Art of the Romantic
Movement
Reform Movements
The Antisuffragists
Immigrants and Urban Challenges
The Big Idea
The population of the United States grew rapidly in the early
1800s with the arrival of millions of immigrants.
Main Ideas
• Millions of immigrants, mostly German and Irish, arrived
in the United States despite anti-immigrant movements.
• Industrialization led to the growth of cities.
• American cities experienced urban problems due to rapid
growth.
Main Idea 1:
Millions of immigrants, mostly German and
Irish, arrived in the United States despite
anti-immigrant movements.
• Large numbers of immigrants crossed the Atlantic in the
mid-1800s to begin new lives in the United States.
• More than 4 million came between 1840 and 1860, mostly
from Europe.
• More than 3 million of them were from Ireland and
Germany.
Immigrants from Ireland and Germany
Irish Immigrants
German Immigrants
• Fled Ireland because of
potato famine in 1840s
• Some educated Germans
fled for political reasons.
• Most were very poor.
• Most were working class
and came for economic
reasons.
• Settled in cities in
Massachusetts, New
Jersey, New York,
Pennsylvania
• Men worked at unskilled
jobs or by building canals
and railroads.
• Women worked as
domestic servants for
wealthy families.
• Many became farmers and
lived in rural areas.
• In cities they had to take
low-paying jobs, such as
tailors, seamstresses,
bricklayers, servants,
clerks, and bakers.
Anti-Immigration Movements
• Many native-born Americans feared losing jobs to immigrants,
who might work for lower wages.
• Most Americans were Protestants before the new immigration.
– Conflict between Protestants and newly arrived Catholic
immigrants.
• Americans who opposed immigration were called nativists.
• Nativists founded a political organization called the KnowNothing Party in 1849 to make it difficult for immigrants to
become citizens or hold public office.
– Wanted to keep Catholics and immigrants out of public office.
– Wanted immigrants to live in United States for 21 years before
becoming citizens.
Main Idea 2:
Industrialization led to the
growth of cities.
• Industrial Revolution led to creation of new jobs in cities.
– Drew rural Americans and immigrants from many nations.
• Transportation Revolution helped to connect cities and make
movement easier.
• Growth of industry and growth of cities led to creation of new
middle class.
– Merchants, manufacturers, professionals, and master
craftspeople.
– New economic level between wealthy and poor.
• People found entertainment and enriched cultural life in cities.
• Cities were compact and crowded during this time.
Main Idea 3:
American cities experienced urban problems
due to rapid growth.
Many city dwellers, particularly immigrants, lived in
tenements: poorly designed apartment buildings that housed
large numbers of people.
Public services were poor—no clean water, public health
regulations, or healthy way to get rid of garbage.
Cities became centers of criminal activity, and most had no
organized police force.
Fire was a constant and serious danger in crowded cities.
Reforming Society
The Big Idea
Reform movements in the early 1800s affected religion,
education, and society.
Main Ideas
• The Second Great Awakening sparked interest in religion.
• Social reformers began to speak out about temperance
and prison reform.
• Improvements in education reform affected many
segments of the population.
• Northern African American communities became involved
in reform efforts.
Main Idea 1:
The Second Great Awakening sparked
interest in religion.
• Second Great Awakening: Christian renewal movement during
1790s and early 1800s.
• Swept upstate New York and frontier regions and later spread to
New England and the South.
• Charles Grandison Finney was an important leader.
– Believed each person was responsible for own salvation.
– Should prove faith by doing good works.
• These ideas angered some traditional ministers, like Boston’s
Lyman Beecher.
• Church membership increased significantly during this period.
– Renewed religious faith of people throughout America.
Main Idea 2:
Social reformers began to speak out about
temperance and prison reform.
• Reform Movements
– Renewed religious faith led to movements to reform
society.
– Urban growth had caused problems.
– Members of the middle class, especially women, led the
efforts.
– They tackled alcohol abuse, prison and education
reform, and slavery.
Reform Movements
Temperance Movement
• Many Americans thought
alcohol abuse caused
family violence, poverty,
and criminal behavior.
• Temperance Movement
was effort to have people
stop drinking hard liquor
• Message spread by
American Temperance
Society and American
Temperance Union
Prison Reform
• Dorothea Dix led
movement to reform prison
system
• Reformers worked to
remove the mentally ill,
runaway children, and
orphans from prisons.
• Governments responded
by building mental
hospitals, reform schools
for children, and houses of
correction that provided
education for prisoners.
Main Idea 3:
Improvements in education reform affected
many segments of the population.
Education in the Early 1800s
• Few teachers were trained, and schoolhouses were small and had
only one room for all students.
• Social background and wealth affected education quality.
Common-School Movement
• Common-School Movement reformers wanted all children taught in
a common place regardless of wealth.
• Horace Mann was a leader in this movement.
– Became Massachusetts’s first secretary of education.
– Convinced the state to double the school budget, raise teachers’
salaries, lengthen the school year, and begin the first school for
teacher training.
More Educational Reforms
• Education reform created opportunities for women.
• Catharine Beecher started an all-women academy.
• Women’s colleges opened, the first in 1821.
• Education reform also helped people with special needs.
• Thomas Gallaudet opened a school for the hearing
impaired in 1817; a school for the blind opened in 1831.
Main Idea 4:
Northern African American communities
became involved in reform efforts.
• Free African Americans usually lived in segregated, or separate,
communities in the North.
• The Free African Religious Society, founded by former slave Richard Allen,
became a model for other groups that worked for racial equality and
education for blacks.
• Many influential African Americans pushed for the creation of schools for
black Americans.
– New York, Philadelphia, and Boston opened elementary schools for
African American children.
– Few colleges would accept African Americans, however.
• In the South, laws barred most enslaved people from receiving any
education.
The Movement to End Slavery
The Big Idea
In the mid-1800s, debate over slavery increased as
abolitionists organized to challenge slavery in the United
States.
Main Ideas
• Americans from a variety of backgrounds actively opposed
slavery.
• Abolitionists organized the Underground Railroad to help
enslaved Africans escape.
• Despite efforts of abolitionists, many Americans remained
opposed to ending slavery.
Main Idea 1:
Americans from a variety of backgrounds
actively opposed slavery.
• Some Americans opposed slavery before the country was even
founded.
• Americans took more organized action supporting abolition, or
the complete end to slavery, in the 1830s.
• Abolitionists came from different backgrounds and opposed
slavery for various reasons.
– Some believed African Americans should have the same
treatment as white Americans, while others were opposed to
full equality.
• The American Colonization Society was founded in 1817 to
establish a colony of freed slaves in Africa.
– Liberia was founded on the west coast of Africa in 1822.
Spreading the Abolitionist Message
William Lloyd Garrison published an abolitionist newspaper,
the Liberator, and helped found the American Anti-Slavery
Society.
Angelina and Sarah Grimké, two white southern women,
were activists who wrote antislavery works, including American
Slavery As It Is.
Frederick Douglass escaped slavery and became one of the most important
African American leaders of the 1800s. Felt the blessings of freedom and
independence should be common for all people, not just white Americans
Sojourner Truth, another former slave, traveled around the country preaching
the truth about slavery and women’s rights. Other African Americans also wrote
narratives about their experiences as slaves in order to expose slavery’s cruelties.
Main Idea 2:
Abolitionists organized the Underground
Railroad to help enslaved
Africans escape.
• By the 1830s a loosely organized group had begun helping
slaves escape from the South.
• Abolitionists created the Underground Railroad: a
network of people who arranged transportation and hiding
places for fugitives, or escaped slaves.
• Fugitives would travel along routes leading them to
northern states or to Canada.
• Harriet Tubman, an escaped slave, led her family and
more than 300 slaves to freedom.
The Underground Railroad
• Enslaved African Americans followed many routes to
freedom.
• They could not be certain of freedom in the free states.
• U.S. law still considered them property.
• Bounty hunters were paid to capture and return any
fugitive slaves they found.
Main Idea 3:
Despite efforts of abolitionists, many
Americans remained opposed
to ending slavery.
• Many white northerners agreed with the South and
supported slavery.
– Thought that ending slavery would take jobs from white
workers.
• Congress forbade its members from discussing antislavery
petitions.
• Many white southerners saw slavery as vital to the
South’s economy and culture.
Women’s Rights
The Big Idea
Reformers sought to improve women’s
rights in American society.
Main Ideas
• Influenced by the abolition movement, many women
struggled to gain equal rights for themselves.
• Calls for women’s rights met opposition from men and
women.
• The Seneca Falls Convention launched the first organized
women’s rights movement in the United States.
Main Idea 1:
Influenced by the abolition movement,
many women struggled to gain
equal rights for themselves.
• Women’s movement for equal rights was an offshoot of
the abolitionist movement
• Fighting for the rights of African Americans led many
women abolitionists to fight for their own rights.
• They found that they had to defend their right to speak in
public.
• Critics did not want women to leave traditional female
roles.
Early Women Reformers
Grimké Sisters
Sojourner Truth
• Sarah Grimké wrote
pamphlet in 1838 arguing
for equal rights for women.
• Powerful supporter of both
abolition and women’s
rights.
• Angelina Grimké refused to
promise to obey her
husband during their
marriage ceremony.
• Born into slavery in 1797.
• Transcendentalist Margaret
Fuller wrote Woman in the
Nineteenth Century (1845),
stressing importance of
individualism to people,
especially to women.
• Took name Sojourner Truth
because she felt her
mission was to be a
sojourner, or traveler, and
spread the truth.
• Never learned to read or
write, but impressed
people with her speeches.
Main Idea 2:
Calls for women’s rights met opposition
from men and women.
The Movement Grows
• Women’s concerns became a national issue when women
took a more active and leading role in reform and abolition.
• Some men also began to fight for women’s rights.
Opposition to Women’s Rights
• Some women believed they did not need new rights.
• Some people thought that women lacked the physical or
mental strength to survive without men’s protection.
Main Idea 3:
The Seneca Falls Convention launched
the first organized women’s rights
movement in the United States.
• Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott organized
the Seneca Falls Convention.
• The convention was significant because it marked the start
of the organized women’s rights movement.
• The convention opened on July 19, 1848, in Seneca Falls,
New York.
• Organizers wrote a Declaration of Sentiments.
Declaration of Sentiments
• Document detailed beliefs about social injustice toward
women
– Used Declaration of Independence as basis for language
– Authors included 18 charges against men
– Signed by some 100 people
• About 240 people attended Seneca Falls Convention
– Men included such reformers as Frederick Douglass.
– Many other reformers who worked in the temperance
and abolitionist movements were present.
Women’s Rights Leaders
Lucy Stone
• Well-known
spokesperson for
Anti-Slavery
Society.
• Was a gifted
speaker who
stirred the nation
on women’s
rights.
Susan B.
Anthony
Elizabeth Cady
Stanton
• Turned fight for
women’s rights
into a political
movement.
• Wrote many
documents and
speeches of the
movement.
• Argued for equal
pay for equal
work—no woman
could be free
without a “purse
of her own.”
• Founder and
leader of
National Woman
Suffrage
Association.
Chapter 15 – A Divided Nation
Section Notes
The Debate over Slavery
Trouble in Kansas
Political Divisions
The Nation Divides
Quick Facts
Upsetting the Balance
A Growing Conflict
Chapter 15 Visual Summary
Video
The States’ Rights
Maps
From Compromise to
Conflict
The Election of 1860
Test Assessment Map
Images
Primary Source: The
Seventh of March Speech
Forcing Slavery Down the
Throat of a Freesoiler
Rebel Government
The Debate over Slavery
The Big Idea
Antislavery literature and the annexation of new lands
intensified the debate over slavery.
Main Ideas
• The addition of new land in the West renewed disputes
over the expansion of slavery.
• The Compromise of 1850 tried to solve the disputes over
slavery.
• The Fugitive Slave Act caused more controversy.
• Abolitionists used antislavery literature to promote
opposition.
Main Idea 1:
The addition of new land in the West
renewed disputes over the
expansion of slavery.
• Additional land gained after Mexican-American War caused
bitter slavery dispute
• Missouri Compromise of 1820 prohibited slavery north of
latitude 36°30’
• President Polk wanted to extend the line to the West
Coast, dividing Mexican Cession into free and enslaved
parts
• Some leaders wanted popular sovereignty, the idea that
political power belongs to the people. States or territories
would decide on whether to permit slavery.
Regional Differences about Slavery
Growing Sectionalism
• Some northerners wanted to ban slavery in the Mexican
Cession.
• The Wilmot Proviso, prohibiting slavery there, was proposed
but not enacted.
• Sectionalism, favoring the interests of one section or region
over the interests of the entire country, was on the rise.
• Antislavery northerners formed a new party–the Free-Soil
Party–to support the Wilmot Proviso.
California Question
• California applied to enter the Union.
• Southerners did not want California to be a free state because
it would upset the balance of slave and free states.
Main Idea 2:
The Compromise of 1850 tried to solve the
disputes over slavery.
• Senator Henry Clay offered Compromise of 1850
– California would enter the Union as a free state.
– The rest of the Mexican Cession would be federal land. The
slavery question would be decided by popular sovereignty.
– Texas could give up land east of the upper Rio Grande. In
return, the government would pay Texas’s debt from when it
was an independent republic.
– Slave trade, but not slavery, would end in the nation’s capital.
– A more effective fugitive slave law would be passed.
• The compromise was enacted and settled most disputes between
slave and free states.
Main Idea 3:
The Fugitive Slave Act caused more
controversy.
Fugitive Slave Act
• Made it a crime to help
runaway slaves and allowed
officials to arrest runaway
slaves in free areas
• Slaveholders could take
suspected fugitives to U.S.
commissioners who, decided
their fate. Commissioners
received more money for
returning them to
slaveholders.
• Accused fugitives could not
testify on their own behalf
Reaction to Act
• Enforcement of act immediate
• Thousands of northern African
Americans fled to Canada in
fear
• Act upset northerners
• Anthony Burns was fugitive
returned to slavery with
federal help in 1854
• Persuaded many to join
abolitionist cause
Main Idea 4:
Abolitionists used antislavery literature
to promote opposition.
• Northern abolitionists used stories of fugitive slaves to
gain sympathy for their cause.
• Fiction also informed people about the evils of slavery.
• Uncle Tom’s Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe was an
influential antislavery novel published in 1852.
– Exposed the harsh reality of slave life
– More than 2 million copies sold within a decade.
– Still widely read as source about harsh realities of
slavery.
Trouble in Kansas
The Big Idea
The Kansas-Nebraska Act heightened tensions in the conflict
over slavery.
Main Ideas
• The debate over the expansion of slavery influenced the
election of 1852.
• The Kansas-Nebraska Act allowed voters to allow or
prohibit slavery.
• Pro-slavery and antislavery groups clashed violently in
what became known as “Bleeding Kansas.”
Main Idea 1:
The debate over the expansion of slavery
influenced the election of 1852.
• Franklin Pierce was Democratic candidate.
– Promised to honor Compromise of 1850 and Fugitive
Slave Act.
– Trusted by southerners.
• Whig Party chose Winfield Scott, a Mexican War hero.
– Southerners did not trust Scott because he had not fully
supported Compromise of 1850.
• Pierce won election by large margin.
Main Idea 2:
The Kansas-Nebraska Act allowed voters to
allow or prohibit slavery.
• Stephen Douglas introduced a bill in Congress to divide
the remainder of Louisiana Purchase into two territories—
Kansas and Nebraska
• Would allow people in each territory to decide on slavery
• Would eliminate the Missouri Compromise’s restriction on
slavery north of the 36°30’ line
• Antislavery northerners were outraged that free territory
could be turned into slave territory.
• Kansas-Nebraska Act was passed in 1854 with southern
support
Main Idea 3:
Pro-slavery and antislavery groups clashed
violently in what became known as
“Bleeding Kansas.”
• Antislavery and pro-slavery groups rushed supporters to
Kansas since popular vote would decide the slavery issue.
• Pro-slavery voters crossed the border to vote, allowing
their side to win the vote. The new government created
strict laws, including that those who helped fugitive slaves
could be put to death.
• Antislavery group created a new government in protest.
• President Pierce recognized only pro-slavery legislature.
• Controversy over slavery affected everyone in Kansas.
Bleeding Kansas
Sack of Lawrence
• Proslavery grand
jury charged
antislavery
government with
treason.
• Proslavery forces
attacked city of
Lawrence, the
location of
antislavery
leaders.
John Brown’s
Response
• Abolitionist John
Brown and sons
killed five proslavery men in
what was called
Pottawatomie
Massacre.
• Kansas collapsed
into civil war and
many citiznes
were killed.
Congress
• Senator Charles
Sumner
criticized proslavery people
and insulted
Senator Pickens
Butler.
• Representative
Preston Brooks
beat Sumner
unconscious.
Political Divisions
The Big Idea
The split over the issue of slavery intensified due to political
division and judicial decisions.
Main Ideas
• Political parties in the United States underwent change due
to the movement to expand slavery.
• The Dred Scott decision created further division over the
issue of slavery.
• The Lincoln-Douglas debates brought much attention to the
conflict over slavery.
Main Idea 1:
Political parties in the United States
underwent change due to the movement
to expand slavery.
• Some Whigs, Democrats, Free-Soilers, and abolitionists joined in
1854 to form the Republican Party.
– United against spread of slavery in the West.
– Nominated explorer John C. Frémont, who stood against
spread of slavery.
• Democrats were in trouble. Those who supported the KansasNebraska debate were not re-elected.
– Nominated James Buchanan, Polk's secretary of state, who
had not been involved in Kansas-Nebraska debate.
• Buchanan was elected by winning 14 of 15 slave states.
Main Idea 2:
The Dred Scott decision created further
division over the issue of slavery.
• Dred Scott was slave of Missouri physician.
• Had been taken to free territory by owner.
• Sued for freedom in 1846 after owner died, arguing he
had become free when he lived in free territory.
• Case reached Supreme Court in 1857.
Dred Scott v. Sandford
• Chief Justice Roger B. Taney wrote majority opinion.
• Ruled that African Americans, whether free or slave, were
not citizens and had no right to sue in federal court;
• Ruled Missouri Compromise restriction on slavery was
unconstitutional.
• Most white southerners were cheered by the decision.
• Ruling stunned many northerners, including Illinois lawyer
Abraham Lincoln, who warned about its consequences.
Main Idea 3:
The Lincoln-Douglas debates brought much
attention to the conflict over slavery.
• Illinois Republicans nominated Abraham Lincoln for the
U.S. Senate in 1858.
• His opponent was Democrat Stephen Douglas, who had
been senator since 1847.
• Lincoln challenged Douglas to what became the historic
Lincoln-Douglas debates.
• The purpose of the Lincoln-Douglas debates was to
announce their candidacies for Senator of Illinois and to
gain support of voters.
Lincoln-Douglas Debates
Lincoln stressed that central issue of campaign was spread of
slavery in the West.
Douglas criticized Lincoln for saying nation could not remain
“half slave and half free.”
Douglas put forth Freeport Doctrine: people had right to
introduce or exclude slavery, and police would enforce their
decision even if it contradicted the Supreme Court.
Freeport Doctrine helped Douglas win, but Lincoln became an
important Republican Party leader and later president.
The Nation Divides
The Big Idea
The United States broke apart due to the growing conflict
over slavery.
Main Ideas
• John Brown’s raid on Harpers Ferry intensified the
disagreement between free states and slave states.
• The outcome of the election of 1860 divided the United
States.
• The dispute over slavery led the South to secede.
Main Idea 1:
John Brown’s raid on Harpers Ferry
intensified the disagreement between free
states and slave states.
• John Brown tried to start uprising in 1858.
– Planned to arm local slaves by attacking federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry,
Virginia.
• John Brown’s raid began on night of October 16, 1859, when he and his men took
over arsenal.
• Could not get slaves to join uprising.
• Federal troops captured Brown and men in attack on arsenal.
• Brown was convicted of treason, murder, and conspiracy, and was hanged.
– Many northerners mourned his death, but criticized methods.
– Most southern whites felt threatened, and newspapers started to call for leaving
the Union in order to remain safe.
Abraham Lincoln’s opinion of John Brown’s raid in Virginia was that the antislavery
movement should not be one of violence and bloodshed.
Main Idea 2:
The outcome of the election of 1860 divided
the United States.
• Northern Democrats chose Senator Stephen Douglas; Southern
Democrats, Vice President John C. Breckinridge.
• The Constitutional Union Party selected John Bell of
Tennessee.
• Republicans nominated Lincoln, who won with most votes of the
free states.
– Lincoln promised not to abolish slavery where it already
existed.
• The result angered southerners.
– Lincoln had not campaigned in the South or carried any
southern states in the election.
Main Idea 3:
The dispute over slavery
led the South to secede.
• Lincoln insisted he would not change slavery in South, but
would not let it expand
• People in South believed that their economy and way of
life would be destroyed
• South Carolina legislature met to consider secession,
formally withdrawing from the Union
• South Carolina seceded, believing it had the right because
it had voluntarily joined the Union
Confederate States of America
• Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, and
Texas joined South Carolina to form Confederate States
of America.
• Jefferson Davis of Mississippi was elected Confederate
president.
• Senator John Crittenden proposed series of
constitutional amendments hoping to satisfy the South by
protecting slavery.
• Lincoln believed there could be no compromise about the
extension of slavery, and the plan was rejected.
Lincoln Takes Office
Lincoln inaugurated on March 4, 1861
Opposed idea that southern states could leave the Union
because they were unhappy with government’s position on
slavery
Announced in inaugural address that he would keep all
government property in the seceding states
Hoped that southern states would return to the Union