It was Kansas that at last proved to many northerners that the sectional crisis would not go away unless slavery also went away. A veteran of the Black Hawk War, Lincoln had relocated to New Salem, Illinois, where he worked a variety of odd jobs, living a life of thrift, self-discipline, and sobriety as he educated himself in preparation for a professional life in law and politics. Southerners and northerners grew ever more antagonistic as they debated the expansion of slavery in the West. Missouris admission to the Union in 1821 exposed deep fault lines in American society. The horrific violence that both endured melted the hearts of many northerners and pressed some to join in the fight against slavery. By the last half of the decade, slavery was back, and this time it appeared even more threatening. These positions attracted a wide range of figures, including a young convert to politics named Abraham Lincoln. In 1848, Free Soil leaders claimed just 10 percent of the popular vote but won over a dozen House seats and even managed to win one Senate seat in Ohio, which went to Salmon P. Chase.17 In Congress, Free Soil members had enough votes to swing power to either the Whigs or the Democrats. it showed that a president could win the The book became a sensation and helped move antislavery into everyday conversation for many northerners. Thomas Hovenden, The Last Moments of John Brown, c. 1882-1884. Figure 1. With sectional tensions at a breaking point, both parties readied for the coming presidential election. 6 What was the. In 1817, eager to put questions of whether this territory would be slave or free to rest, Congress opened its debate over Missouris admission to the Union. A revolution led by the islands rebellious slaves turned Frances most valuable sugar colony into an independent country administered by the formerly enslaved.(2). Southerners feared that without slaverys expansion, the abolitionist faction would come to dominate national politics and an increasingly dense population of enslaved people would lead to bloody insurrection and race war. . The law itself fostered corruption and the enslavement of free Black northerners. The newly acquired territory lay beyond the Louisiana Purchase and therefore was not part of the . The seceded states grappled with internal divisions right away, as states with enslavers sometimes did not support the newly seceded states. Margaretta Mason of Virginia wrote a searing letter to Child attacking her for supporting a murder. In this post-Missouri context, leaders arose to push the countrys new expansionist desires in aggressive new directions. Once again westward expansion challenged this consensus, and this time the results proved even more damaging. Lincoln's House Divided speech (Document A) and Mississippi's declaration of secession letter (Document B) are a cause and effect sequence of the antislavery movement. In 1817, eager to put questions of whether this territory would be slave or free to rest, Congress opened its debate over Missouris admission to the Union. Polk cited the annexation of Texas and the Oregon Territory as campaign cornerstones.12 Yet as Polk championed the acquisition of these vast new lands, northern Democrats grew annoyed by their southern colleagues, especially when it came to Texas. The 1842 Supreme Court case Prigg v. Pennsylvania ruled that the federal governments Fugitive Slave Act trumped Pennsylvanias personal liberty law.13 Antislavery activists believed that the federal government only served southern enslavers and were trouncing the states rights of the North. This action, however, led to renewed charges, many of them leveled from within his own party, that the administration was abusing its powers. The chart, Freedom vs. Slavery, demonstrates the Norths economic and cultural superiority over slave states in terms of everything from population per square mile, capital in manufactures, miles of railroad, the number of newspapers and public libraries, and value of churches. Military service on behalf of both the English and the American army freed thousands of slaves. Few Americans voted for the party. The highest percentages lie along the Mississippi River, in the Black Belt of Alabama, and coastal South Carolina, all of which were centers of agricultural production (cotton and rice) in the United States. In these excerpts, Still offers the readers some of the letters sent to him from abolitionists and formerly enslaved persons. At the same time, Congressman David Wilmot submitted his Wilmot Proviso late in 1846, banning the expansion of slavery into the territories won from Mexico. The Louisiana Purchase of 1803 more than doubled the size of the United States. Enslaved workers also helped give rise to revolutionary new ideals that in time became the ideological foundations of the sectional crisis. As the United States pressed westward, new questions arose as to whether those lands ought to be slave or free. Under its provisions, local authorities in the North could not interfere with the capture of fugitives. They generated tremendous wealth for the British crown. Child responded, and the exchange of letters was published by the American Antislavery Society. He talked with Chief Justice Roger Taney on inauguration day about a court decision he hoped to see handled during his time in office. )It showed that slavery had to be either allowed everywhere or nowhere. it showed that slavery had to be either allowed everywhere or nowhere. Northerners made a stunning display of sympathy on the day of his execution. 7. The Missouri Compromise marked a major turning point in America's sectional crisis because it exposed to the public just how divisive the slavery issue had grown. Bolder and more expansive declarations of equality and freedom followed one after the other. Sectional differences tied to the expansion of plantation slavery in the West were especially important after 1803. The Missouri Territory, by far the largest section of the Louisiana Territory, marked a turning point in the sectional crisis. Clay eventually left Washington disheartened by affairs. Lincoln won the nomination, and with the Democrats in disarray, Republicans knew their candidate Lincoln had a good chance of winning. But as the secession crisis revealed, the South could not tolerate a federal government working against the interests of slaverys expansion and decided to take a gamble on war with the United States. The Haitian Revolution marked an early origin of the sectional crisis. Writer, activist, and teacher Charlotte Forten was born in Philadelphia in 1837 to a well-to-do African American family. Taylor remained in office only a brief time until his unexpected death from a stomach ailment in 1850. Adams was particularly zealous about his abolitionist stance. Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. In 1854 the Missouri Compromise was repealed as part of the Kansas-Nebraska Act. Fortens diary entries from 1854 illuminate sectional tensions, especially in her discussion of the trial of Anthony Burns, a fugitive from slavery. This map, published by the US Coast Guard, shows the percentage of enslaved people in the population in each county of the slave-holding states in 1860. South Carolina declaration of secession, 1860, Abraham Lincoln won the 1860 contest on November 6 with just 40% of the popular vote and not a single southern vote in the Electoral College. In 1852 Harriet Beecher Stowe published her bestselling antislavery novel,Uncle Toms Cabin. The national breakdown over slavery occurred over a long timeline and across a broad geography. Full-page illustration by Hammatt Billings for Uncle Toms Cabin, 1852. Despite the furor, the Missouri crisis did not yet inspire hardened defenses of either slave or free labor. As the national mood grew increasingly grim, Kansas attracted militants representing the extreme sides of the slavery debate. Where exactly are they? Northwest Ordinance, July 13, 1787; Charles C. Tansill, ed.. Conference committee report on the Missouri Compromise, March 1, 1820; Joint Committee of Conference on the Missouri Bill, 03/01/1820-03/06/1820; Record Group 128l; Records of Joint Committees of Congress, 1789-1989; National Archives. But the forces of slavery had powerful allies at every level of government. Yet northern Democrats in crucial swing states remained unmoved by the Republican Partys appeals. Legislators ultimately agreed that this hard ban violated the Constitution, but reaffirmed Missouris ability to deny citizenship to African Americans. Harriet Beecher Stowe,Uncle Toms Cabin, 1852. In January 1846, Polk ordered troops to Texas to enforce claims stemming from its border dispute along the Rio Grande. The balancing act between slavery and freedom continued. In June 1856, the newly named Republican Party held its nominating convention at Philadelphia and selected Californian John Charles Frmont. Secession, in the end, raised the possibility of emancipation through war, a possibility most Republicans knew, of course, had always been an option, but one they nonetheless hoped would never be necessary. In order to justify their party's existence, Republicans required evidence of the slave power's continual harassment of northerners, which Bleeding Kansas easily provided. E. Hergesheimer (cartographer), Th. Questions about the balance of free and slave states in the Union became even more fierce after the US acquired these territories from Mexico by the 1848 in the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. Many others simply used the turmoil of war to make their escape. In the majority opinion, excerpted here, Supreme Court justice Joseph Story decided that the national fugitive slave act overruled Pennsylvanias law. The Compromise of 1850 Known as the "Great Compromiser," Henry Clay formulated the Compromise of 1850 as one of his last signicant political works. He received new canes emblazoned with the words Hit him again!27. 4. A new transatlantic antislavery movement began to argue that freedom was the natural condition of humankind. 2 Revolutionaries seized onto these ideas to stunning effect in the late eighteenth century. Sex slavery, in which women and children are forced into prostitutionsometimes by their own family membersis a growing practice throughout the world. Skip to content. It superseded the Articles of Confederation, the nation's first constitution, in 1789.Originally comprising seven articles, it delineates the national frame and constraints of government. The new coalition called for a national convention in August 1848 at Buffalo, New York. The year 1845 became a pivotal year in the memory of antislavery leaders. Despite the clear limitations of the American Revolution in attacking slavery, the era marked a powerful break in slaverys history. In this climate, the parties opened their contest for the 1860 presidential election. The debate filled newspapers, speeches, and Congressional records. Between 1820 and 1846, sectionalism drew on new political parties, new religious organizations, and new reform movements. It fell to young Stephen Douglas, then, to shepherd the bills through Congress, which he in fact did. The rising controversy over the status of freedom-seeking people swelled partly through the influence of escaped formerly enslaved people, including Frederick Douglass. Calhoun's pamphlet sparked a national debate over the doctrine of nullification and its constitutionality. The Republican platform made the partys antislavery commitments clear, also making wide promises to its white constituents, particularly westerners, with the promise of new land, transcontinental railroads, and broad support of public schools.31 Abraham Lincoln, a candidate few outside Illinois truly expected to win, nonetheless proved far less polarizing than the other names on the ballot. Though Americans at the time made relatively little of the balancing act suggested by the admission of a slave state and a free state, the pattern became increasingly important, particularly when considering power in the United States Senate. Lincoln admired Whig leader Henry Clay of Kentucky, and by the early 1830s, Lincoln certainly fit the image of a developing Whig. In the United States, France, and Haiti, revolutionaries began the work of splintering the old order. Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, Declaration of the Immediate Causes Which Induce and Justify the Secession of South Carolina from the Federal Union,. Congress reached a compromise on Missouris admission, largely through the work of Kentuckian Henry Clay. English political theorists, in particular, began to re-think natural law justifications for slavery. that the administration was abusing its powers. The sectional crisis had at last become a national crisis. The Road to the Civil War The sectional crisis began in the early 1850s. For southerners, defending slavery meant defending southern honor. Dred Scotts Supreme Court case made clear that the federal government was no longer able or willing to ignore the issue of slavery. Later in the month, the states of Florida, Alabama, Georgia, and Louisiana also all left the Union. Takeaway. As northerners radicalized, organizations like the New England Emigrant Aid Company provided guns and other goods for pioneers willing to go to Kansas and establish the territory as antislavery through popular sovereignty. Wikimedia. Rodney O. Davis and Douglas L. Wilson, eds.. Republican Party Platforms: Republican Party Platform of 1860, May 17, 1860. Believing their fate had been sealed as permanent noncitizens, some African Americans would consider foreign emigration and colonization. The sectional crisis of the 1850s, in which Georgia played a pivotal role, led to the outbreak of the Civil War (1861-65). It ma led a line of latitude that separated the land that would be slave states and those that would be free. But the compromise created a new sectional consensus that most white Americans, at least, hoped would ensure a lasting peace. Kansas loomed large over the 1856 election, darkening the national mood. Revolutionaries in the United States declared, All men are created equal, in the 1770s. 11. Legislators battled for weeks over whether the Constitutional framers intended slaverys expansion, and these contests left deep scars. A number of ex-Democrats committed to the party right away, including an important group of New Yorkers loyal to Martin Van Buren. By 1820, preserving the balance of free states and slave states would be seen as an issue of national security. The 1840s opened with a number of disturbing developments for antislavery leaders. Complicating matters further was the rapid expansion of plantation slavery fueled by the invention of the cotton gin in 1793. The heated sectional controversy between the North and the South reached new levels of intensity in the 1850s. Browns raid embarked on October 16. But the most startling development came in 1803 in Haiti. In January, for example, Delaware rejected secession. Questions over the expansion of slavery remained open, but nearly all Americans concluded that the Constitution protected slavery where it already existed. On all sides of the slavery issue, politics became increasingly militarized. Kentucky and Tennessee emerged as slave states, while free states Ohio, Indiana (1816) and Illinois (1818) gained admission along the rivers northern banks. 2. Liberty leaders demanded the end of slavery in the District of Columbia, the end of the interstate slave trade, and the prohibition of slaverys expansion into the West. In conclusion, the Nullification Crisis was both a good and bad thing. In Utah, Mormons were also making claims to an independent state they called Deseret. The Haitian Revolution marked an early origin of the sectional crisis. Borderland negotiations and accommodations along the Ohio River fostered a distinctive kind of white supremacy, as laws tried to keep Black people out of the West entirely. 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