Causes of the Civil War By: Azia Ross

1. Missouri Compromise

1.1. 1820

1.2. Land In the Missouri Compromise

1.3. As America began moving west, the issue of whether or not slavery should be allowed in the new states forming out west became an issue. The first state in which this became an issue was Missouri. It's addition to the United States threatened to upset the balance between Free states and slave states. In 1820, Senator Henry Clay persuaded Congress to approve the Missouri Compromise. The Missouri compromise states: 1. Maine was admitted as a free state. 2. Missouri was admitted as a slave state. 3. Louisiana Territory north of Missouri's southern border was free. 4. Southern slave owners gained the right to pursue escaped fugitives into free regions.

2. Wilmot Proviso

2.1. 1848

2.2. David Wilmot -Creator of the Wilmot Proviso-

2.3. Since the

2.4. Since the Missouri Compromise did not apply to the large territory gained from Mexico in 1848, Representative David Wilmot of Pennsylvania proposed that Congress ban slavery in all territory that might become part of the United States as a result of the Mexican-American War. The proposal passed in the House but failed in the Senate.

3. Free- Soil Party

3.1. 1848

3.2. Creators of the Free soil party

3.3. In the election of 1848, both the Whigs party and the Democratic Party hoped to win by not taking a stand on the issue of slavery. Antislavery Whigs and Democrats joined forces to create a new political party. It called for the territory gained in the Mexican-American War to be "free soil", a place where slavery was banned.

4. Election of Zachary Taylor

4.1. 1848

4.2. Zachary Taylor

4.3. In the election of Zachary Taylor, the controversy over the Wilmot Proviso led to the development of the Free-Soil party. Democrats nominated former Democratic President Martin Van Buren. Senator Class suggested that the people in each new territory should decide for themselves whether or not to allow slavery. Zachary Taylor, a hero of the Mexican-American war, won the election

5. The compromise of 1850

5.1. 1850

5.2. California wanted to be a state but was above the Missouri compromise line.

5.3. Gold was found in California and thousands moved to the area. Soon the territory had enough people to be admitted as a state. This angered the South and they threatened to secede (leave). The compromise was proposed by Senator Henry Clay of Kentucky in January 1850. He hoped this compromise would end the debate over slavery forever. This proposal produced one of the greatest debates in American political history. President Taylor opposed the compromise but died and the new president Millard Fillmore supported it.

6. The fugitive slave act

6.1. 1850

6.2. Fugitive slave being captured.

6.3. The Fugitive slave act allowed government officials to arrest any person accused of being a runaway slave. Suspects had no right to trial to prove that they had been falsely accused. All it took was a slaveholder or any white witness to swear that the suspect was a slaveholder's property. The law also required northern citizens to help capture accused runaways if authorities requested assistance.

7. Uncle Tom's Cabin

7.1. 1852

7.2. The Uncle Tom's Cabin book

7.3. Written by Harriet Stowe in 1852, it was a novel abut kindly Uncle Tom, an enslaved man who is abused by the cruel Simon Legree. The book became a best seller in the North. It shocked thousands of people who had been unconcerned with slavery before reading the book. The book caused people to view slavery as a human, moral problem and not just a political issue. White Southerners were outraged.

8. The Kansas-Nebraska Act

8.1. 1854

8.2. The States affected by the Kansas-Nebraska Act.

8.3. Senator Stephen Douglas pushed the Act in 1854 which led the nation closer to war. He wanted to see a railroad built from Illinois through Nebraska Territory to the Pacific Coast. He suggested creating two new territories: the Kansas territory and the Nebraska Territory. Both were above the Missouri Compromise Line and would become free states which upset the Southerners. To win southern support, he suggested that the issue of slavery be resolved by popular sovereignty. This would undo the Missouri Compromise.

9. "Bleeding Kansas"

9.1. March of 1855

9.2. Continuous fighting in Kansas.

9.3. Both pro slavery and anti slavery settlers flooded to Kansas to try and win the majority. Thousands of people from Missouri entered Kansas in March of 1855 to vote illegally in the election of a territorial legislature. Kansas had 3,000 voters but almost 8,000 people voted. Of the 39 people (legislatures) elected, all but 3 supported slavery. Antislavery settlers refused to accept the results and held another election. Kansas now had two governments. Violence broke out. In April, a proslavery sheriff was shot when he tried to arrest some antislavery settlers in the town of Lawrence. He returned the next month with 800 men and attacked the town. Three days later John Brown, an antislavery settler from Connecticut led seven men to a proslavery settlement near Pottawat Creek and murdered five proslavery men and boys. This started widespread fighting in Kansas.

10. Bloodshed in the Senate

10.1. Date

10.2. Charles Sumner

10.3. Charles Sumner of Massachusetts was the leading abolitionist senator and made fiery speeches denouncing the proslavery legislature in Kansas. In one of his speeches he singled out Andrew Butler who was an elderly senator from South Carolina who was not present when he gave his speech. A few days later his nephew, Congressman Preston Brooks, marched into the senate chamber and beat Summer with a heavy cane until he fell to the floor bloody and unconscious. Sumner never really recovered from his injuries.

11. Republican Party

11.1. 1854

11.2. The Whig republican party meeting flyer

11.3. The Whig party split in 1854 and many northern Whigs formed a new political party called the Republican Party. Their main goal was to stop the spread of slavery into the western territories. Their antislavery stand attracted many northern democrats and Free-Soil members. The party quickly became very powerful. In the first congressional elections held just a few months after the party was created, 105 of 245 candidates were elected to the House of Representatives. Democrats also lost control of two northern state legislatures. Two years later the party ran its first candidate for president John C. Fremont.

12. Election of 1856

12.1. 1856

12.2. John C. Fremont

12.3. First Republican candidate John C. Fremont (army officer who help win California's independence in the Mexican-American War) waged a strong antislavery campaign

13. Dred Scott vs. Sanford Case

13.1. March 1857

13.2. Dred Scott

13.3. Dred Scott was an enslaved person who had once been owned by a U.S. Army doctor. They had lived In Illinois and wisconsin for a short time where slavery was illegal. They settled in Missouri. With the help of an anitslavery lawyer, Scott sued for his freedom because he argued that he was free because he had lived where slavery was illegal. The case reached the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court delivered its verdict in the case on March of 1857' three days later President Buchanan took office. The Chief Justice Roger B. Taney wrote the decision for the Court. Scott was not a free man for two reasons: 1. Scott had no right to sue ub federal court because African Americans were not citizens; 2. Merely living in free territory does not make an enslaved person free. Slaves were property and property rights were protected by the United States constitution. The ruling also said that Congress did not have the power to prohibit slavery in any territory. Thus, the Missouri Compromise was unconstitutional. Southern ears were happy because slavery was legal in all territories. Northerners were upset because now slavery could spread to the west.

14. The Lincoln and Douglass Debates

14.1. 1858

14.2. Abraham Lincoln

14.3. Lincoln was chosen as the presidential candidate for Senate against Senator Douglass in 1858. Lincoln and Douglass were political and personal rivals. Lincoln challenged Douglass to a series of public debates. Thousands gathered to hear them speak. Newspapers reported what each man said throughout the nation. Douglass defended popular sovereignty and said each state had the right to decide for or against the spread of slavery. He predicted that slavery would die out on its own but in the meantime Americans had an obligation to keep it out of the Western territories. In the end, Douglass won the elections but now Lincoln was known throughout the nation.

15. John Brown attacks Harper's Ferry

15.1. 1859

15.2. John Brown. Photograph taken near the end of his life. After he went mentally ill.

15.3. John a town was driven out of Kansas after the Pohawatomic Creek Massacre and returned to New England. He began a plot to free people in the South that were enslaved. In 1859' Brown and a small group of supporters attacked the town of Harper's Ferry, Virginia. His goal was to take control of the guns that the U.S. Army had stored there. He thought that enslaved African Americans would support him. He would give them weapons and lead them in a revolt. He gained control of The guns but troops commanded by Colonel Robert E. Lee surrounded Brown's force before it could escape. Ten of Brown's followers were killed. Brown was wounded and captured. At his trial, he sat quietly as the court found him guilty of murder and treason. He was hanged in Virginia on December 2, 1859. Many people in the North considered him a hero. Southerners were shocked that Northerners thought this about a person who tried to lead a revolt against them.

16. Political Parties Divide

16.1. 1854

16.2. Whig Party Symbol

16.3. As the Whig Party split apart in 1854, many northern Whigs joined a new political party. It was called the Republican Party, and its main goal was to stop the spread of slavery into the western territories. Of the 245 candidates elected to the U.S. House of Representatives, 105 were Republicans. The Republicans' anti-slavery stand also attracted northern Democrats and Free-Soil Party members.

17. Election of 1860

17.1. 1860

17.2. Election of 1860

17.3. The Republicans chose Abraham Lincoln as their presidential candidate. His criticisms of slavery during his debates with Douglas had made him popular in the North. Northern Democrats chose Stephen Douglas as their candidate. Southern Democrats picked Vice President John Breckinridge of Kentucky. Some Southerners still hoped to heal the split between North and South. The election showed just how fragmented the nation had become.

18. Southern States Secede

18.1. 1860

18.2. The Southern states that seicede

18.3. Lincoln's election sent shock waves through the South. To many southerners, it seemed that the South no longer had a voice in the national government. They believed that the President and Congress were now set against their interests- especially slavery- South Carolina was the first southern state to secede from the Union. On December 20, 1860 the convention passed a declaration that "the Union now subsisting between South Carolina and the other states, under the name of the United States of America' is hereby dissolved".

19. The Confederate States of America

20. The Crittenden Plan

20.1. 1861

20.2. John C. Crittenden

20.3. A plan developed by Senator John C. Crittenden of Kentucky to compromise with the South one last time. It was presented to Congress in late February, 1861 while the South was forming its new government but it did not pass.