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The Union in Peril
1848-1860
Four Main Causes of the
Civil War
 Slavery
 Constitutional Disputes:
States’ Rights vs. Federal
Rights
 Economic Differences:
Industrialized North vs. the
Agricultural South
 Political Blunders and
Extremism
Conflict over
Territorial Status
 Northern Democrats and the
Whigs supported the Wilmot
Proviso
 Were they abolitionists?
 They supported the exclusion of
ALL blacks from the Mexican
Cession.
The Free-Soilers
 They did not demand the end of slavery,
just the extension of it.
 They wanted to keep the West for whites
only so there would be no competition with
slaves OR free blacks.
 Party slogan: “free soil, free labor, and
free men”
 Advocated free homesteads and internal
improvements
Southern Position
 Disliked abolitionists and FreeSoilers.
 Moderates: wanted an extension
of the Missouri Compromise line
westward
Popular Sovereignty
 Proposed by Lewis Cass (MO-D)
 Slavery should be determined by
popular vote.
The Election of 1848
 Lewis Cass (Democrat): platform was
popular sovereignty
 Zachary Taylor (Whig): took no
position on slavery in the new
territories
 Martin Van Buren (Free-Soil):
Consisted of “conscience” Whigs
and anti-slavery Democrats
 Taylor defeated Cass because the
Free-Soil party took away many
Democrats’ votes
The Compromise of 1850
 1849: CA Constitution banned slavery
 President Taylor supported the free
admission of CA and NM
 Taylor’s actions sparked talk of secession
 Henry Clay proposed the following:
 Admit CA as a free state
 Divide rest of Mexican Cession in UT and NM:
allow popular sovereignty to decide the issue
 Disputed land in TX and NM to be given to the new
territories in exchange for the assumption of TX
$10 million debt
 Ban slave trade in DC but still allow whites to
hold slaves
 Adopt and enforce a new Fugitive Slave Law
Compromise Debate
 Henry Clay (KY): for compromise
 Daniel Webster (MA): argued for compromise to
save the Union and alienated his abolitionist
supporters
 John C. Calhoun (SC): argued against compromise
and for states’ rights
 William H. Seward (NY): against the compromise and
argued that there was a higher law than the
Constitution
 Stephen A. Douglas (IL): prepared the components
of the compromise for separate passage
 President Fillmore, succeeding Taylor, signed the
compromises into law.
Fugitive Slave Law
 Northerners were obligated to
return escaped slaves to the
South
 Fugitive slave cases were
placed under the jurisdiction of
the federal government
 They were denied the right of
trial by jury
Underground Railroad
 Not dominated by white abolitionists
 Northern free blacks and ex-slaves
were the main “conductors”
 Harriet Tubman: 19 trips and helped
300 slaves escape
 Frederick Douglass and Sojourner
Truth also took an active role
Literature
 Uncle Tom’s Cabin (1852) by Harriet Beecher Stowe;
promoted abolitionism in both the North and in
Europe
 Lincoln: “So you’re the little woman who wrote the
book that made this great war.”
 Impending Crisis of the South (1857) by Hinton
Helper showed that slavery hurt the Southern
economy
 Southerners argued that slavery was sanctioned
by the Bible.
 George Fitzhugh argued that the northern
capitalist wage system was worse than slavery.
Election of 1852
 General Winfield Scott (Whig):
ignored the issue of slavery and
concentrated on internal
improvements.
 Franklin Pierce (Democrat-NH):
acceptable to the South because he
supported the Fugitive Slave Law
 The Democrats won all but 4 states.
Kansas-Nebraska Act
(1854)
 Democrat Stephen Douglas wanted to win
support to build a transcontinental
railroad.
 He obtained southern approval by
introducing this bill.
 Two states would be formed and popular
sovereignty would decide the issue.
 Both territories were located North of
the Missouri Compromise line.
 Renewed the sectional controversy.
 A new antislavery party was born: the
Republicans.
New Parties
 Know-Nothing Party: opposition to
Catholics and immigrants
 Republican Party
 Founded in 1854 in Racine, WI
 Direct reaction to the passage of the
Kansas-Nebraska Act
 Coalition of free-soilers, antislavery
Whigs and Democrats made up the party
 Asked for a repeal of the KansasNebraska Act and the Fugitive Slave Law
 Abolitionists would join later
Election of 1856
 Republican: John C. Fremont
(CA)
 Know-Nothings: former
President Millard Fillmore
 Democrats: James Buchanan
 Democrats won, but Fremont
carried 11/16 free states
Bleeding Kansas
 Settled by antislavery farmers from
the Midwest
 Slaveholders from MO set up
homesteads
 New England Emigrant Aid Society:
paid for the transportation of
antislavery settlers
 Proslavery Missourians created a
proslavery legislature in
Lecompton, KS
 Antislavery settlers created own
The Caning
 Senator Charles Sumner attacked
the administration about its handling
of “Bleeding Kansas”
 Included personal attacks on SC
Senator Andrew Butler
 Butler’s nephew, Congressman
Preston Brooks beat Sumner over
the head with a cane
 Northerners were angry and voted
for censure, but Southerners sent
Brooks numerous canes to replace
his broken one