First off, one the main reasons of the secession were political and economic factors. The biggest contributor of these factors was the lack of seats in congress of the southern states. Ever since the 1820s, the Northern region of the United States held the majority in congress due to the higher amount of population in the North. By the time the 1860s came, the North has a population of about 22 million people while the South only had about 9 million, with only 5 million of those being free men. With such a higher amount of seats in congress representing Northern interests, it was inevitable that the policies would reflect only Northern interests. This is most observable through taxations, a job of congress under the Constitution. …show more content…
A large argument for the South was that the federal government did not reflect their interests. This was proven true by the hurting taxes. The second way it was starting to prove true was the increasing sentiment of abolitionism in the North seeing slavery as something unnecessary. With Slavery being threatened, the South felt that they would be left economically destroyed if the North were to succeed in its mission of abolition. They felt this way for two reasons. First, their agriculture industry depended on slaves and secondly, the South saw slavery as an industry on its 5 "Selected Quotations from 1830 to 1865." Civilwarcauses.org. N.p., n.d. Web. 03 Nov. own because slaves were considered property. Mississippi senator, Albert Brown, said, "Mr. President, it seems to me that northern Senators most pertinaciously overlook the main point at issue between the two sections of our Confederacy. We claim that there is property in slaves, and they deny it.”6 Until the late 1850s, the North and South had largely avoided large disputes over slavery. Yet the conflict about slavery was inevitable as a new question arose on how to apply slavery policies in the new westward …show more content…
Furthermore, an imaginary line was placed at 36o 30 ́ latitude and the territories north of the line would be free while the ones below it would be slave states. The worked until the acquisition of territories from Mexico. Ultimately, all territories acquired from Mexico would be slave states except for California. This would be known as the Compromise of 1850. The last event, and certainly the most controversial one, would be the Kansas-Nebraska act and the events that followed such as “Bloody Kansas”. In said act, the territories west of Missouri would be split into two, Kansas and Nebraska. Later, these two states would choose for themselves to become slave states or free states. This outrages the abolitionists because the act also repealed the Missouri act. By doing so, it let the states choose what type of states they would become while slavery would 6 "Selected Quotations from 1830 to 1865." Civilwarcauses.org. N.p., n.d. Web. 03 Nov. normally be illegal there with the Missouri Compromise still in place. Afterwards, both sides, the abolitionists and people that were pro-slavery, went to Kansas from all over the country to vote on Kansas’ fate. This lead to the conflict know as “Bloody Kansas”
This concept would be known to be Popular Sovereignty. The Kansas – Nebraska Act would perform in somewhat contradictory ways to the Missouri Compromise of 1820, but simultaneously taking its concepts into consideration. But, this act would come at a heavy price of violence between Kansas settlers about pro-slavery and anti-slavery views. However, the act would also instill debates upon whether or not Texas would be a free or slave state. Being annexed would stir up controversy on the topic. Either way decided, free or slave, it would make the U.S. have an unbalance of free and slave states.
requested for admission into the union as a slave state. However, the issue between factions of
A leading example of the struggles of slavery in the western states was the struggle over slavery in Kansas. Document F depicts a political cartoon basically stating that Stephen Douglas, Franklin Pierce, and James Buchanan all attempted intentionally or unintentionally to spread slavery to the West. Stephen Douglas proposed the Kansas-Nebraska Act in which the Midwest Nebraska territory would be divided into two states Kansas and Nebraska and the issue of slavery would be determined by in state vote known as "popular sovereignty". Franklin Pierce aided with the signing of the bill. The results upon this bill was harsh fighting between pro-slavery supporters and non-slavery supporters in Kansas over this issue. It also led to the non-reelection of Pierce and the end to the Whig party, along with the introduction of the sectional Republican party, who opposed the Kansas-Nebraska Act. An attempt at forcing slavery into
whether they would choose to be free or slave states. In addition, the Kansas-Nebraska Act overturned the Missouri
A sequence of violent events occurred involving abolitionists and pro-slavery believers. These events took place in the Kansas territory where both pro-slavery and anti-slavery constitutions competed. This dispute further strained the North, South, and West, making sectionalism more extreme and the country split further apart. If Sectionalism and the Treaty of Guadalupe were caused by the Mexican American war, and Sectionalism and the Treaty of Guadalupe caused Bleeding Kansas, it can be inferred that Bleeding Kansas was one of the causes of the American Civil War. All these items kept boiling up until they had to explode with the Civil War.
America has had a bloody rise to the great nation it is today, and that continuous battle has forged it into a strong nation that has been a shining star for many years. The greatest war in American history was, without a doubt, the Civil War. It cost more than 600,000 lives on both sides, ultimately spilling American blood no matter who won how many battles. But before all of this, another fight was carrying on. It was fought for nearly identical reasons, only on a smaller scale. The Bleeding Kansas was a fight over the decision to make Kansas a slave state or a free state. It was brought about by the Nebraska-Kansas Act, put forth by Senator Stephan A. Douglas. The decision to leave the choice up to popular sovereignty led to the early clashes
Tensions about what congress would do about slavery in the new territories increased rapidly. Lincoln, during his presidency, explains the difference between anti and pro slavery people. He explains that the selfish nature of man allows him to go towards slavery, but man’s nature to be just and right allows him to oppose slavery (Lincoln). Wilmot tried to pass a law called the Wilmot proviso, a law forbidding slavery in the new territories ceded by Mexico. A wild debate over this law ensued between the North and South (Remini).
It destroyed the Whig party and created the Republican party, due to their views opposing slavery. What seemed like a democratic solution to Douglas led to an extreme period of violence in the border of Kansas, where proslavery and antislavery settlers flocked to outvote the other side. Senator David Atchison led “border ruffians” into Kansas to illegally vote for slavery, which won the first-round (Hakim 178). Following every election afterwards, the border ruffians and abolitionists both sent their forces to Kansas, carrying weapons, to win the region. Moreover, by 1856, there were two governments, one for the Free Soilers and one for proslavery (Hakim 178).
New Mexico and Utah were permitted to be Slave states. Which meant there would still be a struggle with what each of these slave states would be. The slave trade in DC was outlawed but slavery was still permitted, and fugitive slave laws were
The northern states and the southern states shared different economic prospects where the former had embraced mechanization while the latter still employed human slaves as a factor of production. The southern states were therefore facing economic doldrums and would not entertain any ideas that may have led to an insurrection from its enslaved populace.
The prospect of slavery’s extension into the American West most certainly shaped sectional politics by inflaming grievances and tensions, and sparking heated and occasionally violent protests, yet compromise sometimes was reached – occasionally among strange political bedfellows – in the interest of holding off the specter of civil war. This paper will focus on the issues surrounding the possible extension of slavery into the following areas: the Missouri Territory and the Louisiana Purchase in general, Texas (annexation), the Oregon Territory, California (annexation), Nebraska (unorganized), and the Kansas Territory.
“Organized and championed by Henry Clay, the Compromise of 1850 was a series of laws and policy enactments that formed a comprehensive new national policy toward issues of slavery and westward expansion. At the core of this debate was the question of whether or not frontier territories should join the Union as new slave states. Southern states preferred an expansion of slavery into new territories, whereas northern states argued in favor of abolishing slavery in any new states. The Compromise of 1850 determined that new states would be slave-free, and the slave trade was also abolished in Washington, D.C. In exchange for these concessions, southern states received an amendment to the Fugitive Slave Act, which forced northern states to take more aggressive measures to return escaped slaves into the southern states from which they departed.
4.) Why did some legislators argue that moving slaves from Southern states to Western territories—“diffusing” them—was necessary and good?
What was the issue at stake in "Bleeding Kansas," and how did events in Kansas reflect the growing sectional division between the North and the South?
The balance of free states and slavery states was still a very important, but also difficult question. At that time, big issue got caused. Because of Kansas’s huge population, Nebraska needed to be built a new state. According to Missouri Compromise, slavery was not available in the north of latitude 36°30’. Therefore, Nebraska had to be a free state. However, Nebraska was so close to Missouri, and Missouri was a slavery state. The Slaveholders and proslavery didn’t see the threat from a closed free states, they thought that their slaves would escape to Nebraska if that happened. So, they disagreed. Finally, this unorganized territory was divided to two part after the Kansas-Nebraska Act was announced. The north was Nebraska and the south was