1. Chapter 4 – The Union in Crisis
Section Notes
Video
The Nation Splits Apart
The Civil War
Reconstruction
The Nation Splits Apart
The Civil War
Reconstruction
Maps
The Conflict Over Slavery
The War in the West, 1861 – 1863
The War in the East, 1861 – 1863
Quick Facts
Causes and Effects of Secession
The Generals
Hopes Raised and Denied
Causes and Effects of Reconstruction
Images
Political Cartoon: Southern Chivalry
Battle of Chancellorsville
Causes and Effects of the Civil War
Atlanta

2. The Nation Splits Apart
The Main Idea
By 1850 the issue of slavery dominated national politics, leading to sectional divisions and, finally, the secession of the southern states.
Reading Focus
How did the issue of slavery influence expansion in the 1850s?
How did other sectional conflicts influence national politics in the 1850s?
What was Abraham Lincoln’s path to the White House?
How and why did the South secede and form the Confederacy?

3. Kansas, Expansion, and Slavery
In Kansas, the government left the issue of slavery for the residents to decide, though there were widely differing opinions.
During the 1850s, several violent battles took place between pro-slavery and anti-slavery forces, including the Marais des Cygnes Massacre, when a gang of 30 pro-slavery men gunned down 11 anti-slavery settlers and killed five.
So much violence took place that the area was called “Bleeding Kansas,” and the North and South realized that Kansas would play a leading role in deciding the slavery issue in America.
Victory in the Mexican War raised an important question about U.S. expansion. As new states formed and joined the Union, would they allow slavery?
In Congress, only perfect balance between slave and anti-slave states meant equal representation for both sides.

4. The Compromise of 1850
Adding California to the Union as an anti-slavery state would shift the balance of power in Congress toward the North.
In January 1850 Kentucky Senator Henry Clay introduced a plan to preserve the balance of power, sparking long debates.
After months of debate, Congress passed the Compromise of 1850, which admitted California as a free state, set the Texas-New Mexico border, outlawed slave commerce in the nation’s capital, and made slavery a popular sovereignty issue in Utah and New Mexico.
Uncle Tom’s Cabin, an anti-slavery book by Harriet Beecher Stowe, became a huge success despite Southern outrage.
One provision, the Fugitive Slave Act, made it a crime to aid runaway slaves and allowed the arrest of escaped slaves. Many northerners actively broke this law, which angered slave owners.

5. The Kansas-Nebraska Act
A proposed railroad to link California with the rest of the nation caused conflict.
Illinois senator Stephen A. Douglas thought that a northern route would make Chicago an urban center.
He proposed organizing the western lands into two territories, Nebraska, and Kansas.
To win southern support, he suggested dropping the Missouri Compromise’s ban on slavery, in favor of popular sovereignty, where residents vote to decide on the issue.
In May 1854 the Kansas-Nebraska Act became law, which outraged northerners, weakened the Democrats, and destroyed the Whig Party.
Soon after, northern Whigs joined the Free-Soil Party and other anti-slavery parties to found the Republican Party.

6. Sectional Conflicts in Kansas
In Lawrence, Kansas, a sheriff's posse attacked anti-slavery newspapers and burned buildings in what is known as the Sack of Lawrence.
In response, John Brown, an abolitionist, and others killed five pro-slavery settlers on Pottawatomie Creek in Kansas.
Before Kansas could apply for statehood, voters had to approve a constitution to allow or ban slavery.
To win votes, both sides raised money and organized to bring in more settlers.
Fraud and violence marked early elections. Armed pro-slavery Missourians crossed into Kansas to vote.
By 1856 Kansas had two governments— one for slavery and one against.
In 1857 a pro-slavery convention tried to push through a pro-slavery Kansas constitution, the Lecompton constitution, which allowed slavery and excluded freed slaves from the Bill of Rights. It was not ratified.
Kansas was eventually admitted as a free state, which deepened sectional divisions.

7. Events Spark National Political Conflict
Election of 1856
The nation was divided on presidential candidates.
Democrats nominated James Buchanan, a former senator.
The New Republican and American Parties nominated others.
Democrats won by characterizing Republicans as extremists on slavery.
Dred Scott Decision
Buchanan had pledged not to interfere with slavery where it existed.
Dred Scott, a slave who lived on free soil, sued for freedom.
The Court ruled that the 5th Amendment protected slave owners’ rights.
John Brown’s Raid
Abolitionist John Brown planned a raid on the U.S. arsenal to get guns for a slave revolt.
U.S. Marines stormed the arsenal and captured Brown and his followers.
They were tried for treason and executed, though many northerners thought Brown was a hero.

8. Abraham Lincoln Rises Lincoln’s Upbringing
Lincoln was born in 1809 in a one-room cabin near Louisville, Kentucky.
Lincoln’s family was very poor, held no slaves, and opposed slavery. They moved to the Indiana Territory in 1816.
In 1828 he got a job on a riverboat from Indiana to New Orleans, and there had his first contact with slavery at a New Orleans slave auction.
Lincoln’s Early Political Career
Lincoln moved to New Salem, Illinois, and ran for state legislature.
He won a seat in the Illinois General Assembly and studied law at home.
He married Mary Todd, the daughter of a Kentucky slaveholder.
In 1846 he was elected to Congress, and proposed the radical idea of “compensated emancipation,” or paying slave owners to free their slaves.
Lincoln campaigned for successful Whig Party presidential candidate Zachary Taylor, and was upset that he was not given the position he was promised.
He resigned from Congress in 1849 and went home to Illinois to practice law. However, the Kansas-Nebraska Act, which allowed all residents to vote on slavery, sparked him to reenter politics as a Republican.

9. The Lincoln-Douglas Debates
Debates and Election
The Lincoln-Douglas Debates
Lincoln defeated Stephen A. Douglas in the Senatorial race.
In his acceptance speech, he called the U.S. “a house divided against itself” on the issue of slavery.
National news attention about the speech led to the Lincoln-Douglas debates.
During the debates:
Lincoln challenged Douglas on popular sovereignty.
In the Freeport Doctrine, Douglas said people could stop slavery by refusing to pass laws allowing it.
Lincoln called slavery immoral but denied proposing racial equality.
The Election of 1860
Two years later, Lincoln and Douglas ran against each other for president, facing hard battles.
The Democrats were divided and split completely, as southern Democrats walked out of the nominating convention.
The remaining Democrats nominated Douglas, and southern Democrats elected John Breckenridge.
Southern moderates started their own party, the Constitutional Union Party.
The Republicans chose Lincoln because his abolitionist views were strong but moderate.
Lincoln won the election in the North and became president.

10. Southern Secession: Causes and Effects
A week after Lincoln’s election, the South Carolina legislature called a convention to consider leaving the Union.
They decided for it, and the rest of the Lower South quickly followed, including Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, and Texas.
Four other states—Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee, and Arkansas—also threatened to secede.
Though many southerners and even up to 40 percent of delegates opposed secession, the decision was made by radicals at the convention.
Northern reactions to secession varied, with some happy to lose the slave states and others worried about the long-term effects.
Causes of Secession
The Compromise of 1850
The Kansas-Nebraska Act
The Lincoln-Douglas Debates
The Election of 1860
Effects of Secession
South Carolina fears a northern-controlled government will act against slavery and withdraws from the Union.
Several states follow, forming the Confederate States of America.

11. The Confederacy is Born
In February 1861, representatives of the seven seceded states met in Montgomery, Alabama, to form a new nation. They wrote a constitution that allowed slavery and guaranteed slave holder’s rights.
They chose Jefferson Davis, a former U.S. Senator from Mississippi, as president.
They created an association of the states called the Confederate States of America, or the Confederacy, which, problematically, lacked national currency and official headquarters.
The House and Senate sought ways to avoid war, including appointing special committees to suggest possible solutions.
One plan, the Crittenden Compromise, proposed new constitutional amendments, including allowing slavery in some parts of America and compensating slave holders for escaped slaves.
The negotiations failed, as Lincoln’s presidency was a main reason for secession. Lincoln privately opposed any extension of slavery, though he promised in his inaugural speech not to interfere with slavery where it already existed.

12. The Civil War The Main Idea
The Civil War broke out following a Confederate attack on Fort Sumter, leading to widespread fighting, heavy casualties, and the eventual defeat of the Confederacy.
Reading Focus
How did the Civil War begin, and what were some early battles?
What was life like during the Civil War?
How did continued fighting turn the tide of the war?
What happened in the final phase of the war?

13. Northern Goals and Advantages
The Civil War Begins
In 1861 Lincoln sent only non-military supplies to the struggling soldiers at Fort Sumter, one of few Union-held places in the South.
The Confederacy opened fire on Fort Sumter and the Civil War began.
Lincoln called for volunteers to join the northern army and slave states in the Union were forced to choose sides.
Questions rose over border states such as Maryland and Missouri, which went to the Union, and Kentucky, which went to the Confederacy.
The North and South had different goals and advantages for war.
Northern Goals and Advantages
Goals:
Preserve the Union
Abolish slavery
Advantages:
Larger population
More railroads
Southern Goals and Advantages
Goals:
Preserve their way of life
Be left alone with slavery unchanged
Advantages:
Nation’s best soldiers
Cotton exports for foreign aid

14. Tactics, Technology, and Battle
Though the top generals of both sides were trained at West Point and knew military tactics from the Mexican War, this Civil War was different for many reasons:
Far deadlier weapons, including better rifles, machine guns, and exploding shells
The use of observation balloons and camouflage
Officers and government communicated quickly by telegraph.
Railroads moved large numbers of troops quickly
The Battle of Bull Run near Washington, D.C. was the war’s first major battle. Untrained troops on both sides transformed the battle to chaos and ended hopes for a short war.

15. Different Regions of the War
War in the West
Gaining control of the Mississippi River would split the Confederacy in two.
In early 1862 Union general Ulysses S. Grant opened two major water routes into the western Confederacy.
Grant moved South, winning a major victory at the Battle of Shiloh in Tennessee, but the fierce battle dashed northern hopes that the rebellion would collapse on its own.
A Union fleet under Admiral David Farragut moved north along the Mississippi, capturing New Orleans and other river cities.
War in the East
Union general George B. McClellan delayed his attack on the Confederate capital at Richmond.
Confederate general Robert E. Lee lured Union forces to the Second Battle of Bull Run in Virginia, and won.
Defeat in Virginia hurt northern morale, so Lee wanted to invade Maryland, hoping a victory on Union soil would force northern surrender or gain foreign trust and aid.
The Battle of Antietam, the bloodiest of the war, was considered a Union victory only because it stopped Lee’s northern invasion.

16. African Americans during the Civil War
In the South, slave labor helped to provide the food necessary to feed the Confederate army.
Thousands of slaves, however, escaped to join invading Union troops, and many were hired.
As the fighting continued, some northerners wanted not only to preserve the union but to punish the South for its slavery policies and free the slaves.
On January 1, 1863, President Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation, freeing enslaved people in all areas that were in rebellion against the U.S.
Some northerners opposed the proclamation, others thought it did not go far enough.
The proclamation encouraged freedmen to join Union forces, where almost 180,000 African Americans served in segregated units.

17. Conditions at War and at Home
Conditions for Soldiers
Most soldiers died not from wounds but from contagious diseases and illness due to poor sanitation and polluted water.
Soldiers spent most of their days in camp, doing drills, writing letters home, and playing games.
Conditions were terrible for prisoners of war at overcrowded camps and prisons.
The Home Front
Southerners suffered property damage, food shortages, and inflation.
The Confederacy, started the first U.S. draft and the North followed, which caused riots.
Anti-war demonstrators hurt the Union war effort, They were called Copperheads by critics and were jailed without trial.
Women and War
Some women disguised themselves as men and enlisted in the army, while some worked as spies.
Women took over daily life at home, on plantations, and in factories.
About 3,000 women served in the Union army as nurses
Some women, such as Clara Barton, cared for the wounded on battlefields.

18. Fighting Continues
The Civil War tore America apart, but it also had international effects.
Union naval blockades stopped the South from trading with the world.
When blockades became hard to cross southerners used blockade runners, or low, sleek ships that took cotton to Caribbean ports for transfer to Europe.
Southerners made an ironclad ship that withstood cannon fire to break through the blockade, but when the North built one also, the first ironclad battle took place and changed naval warfare forever.
Though most action was in the East, forces also clashed west of the Mississippi River over natural resources, additional soldiers, and territory.
Congress admitted Kansas, Dakota, Colorado, and Nevada territories as free states, then they created Idaho, Arizona, and Montana territories.
Lincoln appointed pro-Union officials to head the territories.
He did not enforce the draft in the West, though many joined voluntarily.
More than 10,000 Native Americans fought, many for the Union.

19. Three Major Battles
After disastrous Union losses at Fredericksburg in December 1862, Union forces were ready to fight again by spring.
General Joseph Hooker was now in command, and he led three major battles in 1862 and 1863.
Chancellorsville
Hooker planned to take Richmond by surprise.
Lee marched his army west, leaving some behind as a distraction.
Lee ordered a surprise attack and won the battle.
Gettysburg
Lee tried to invade the North again.
In this three day battle, troops held positions for two days, until 15,000 Confederate troops charged the center lines and in the battle lost most of their troops. Lee retreated to Virginia.
Vicksburg
Meanwhile, Grant took Vicksburg, a Confederate stronghold in Mississippi.
He shelled the city for weeks, trying to starve out defenders, until they surrendered.

20. The Final Phase Campaigns of 1864 The Election of 1864
After major victories, the Confederacy won the Battle of Chickamauga, but Grant rescued the Union at Chattanooga.
Lincoln gave Grant control of all the Union armies, and Grant moved the Army of the Potomac further and further south, despite heavy losses in the Battle of the Wilderness and the Battle of Spotsylvania.
After the Battle of Cold Harbor, Grant began a siege of Richmond to cut supplies to the capital.
Then Union general Sherman invaded Georgia, laid siege to Atlanta, closed railroad access to the city, and forced Confederate general Hood’s troops to abandon the city.
The Election of 1864
While Sherman took Atlanta, the Democrats chose popular General George McClellan as their candidate.
The Republicans chose Andrew Johnson, a pro-Union Democrat, as Lincoln’s vice president to help Lincoln’s wavering appeal.
The Emancipation Proclamation and high casualties made the war unpopular and even Lincoln expected to lose the election.
News of Sherman’s Atlanta capture shifted public opinion, and Lincoln defeated McClellan, allowing Congress to pass the Thirteenth Amendment ending slavery.

21. The War Ends
As Lincoln began his second term in March 1865, the war seemed nearly over. Lincoln announced his intention to be forgiving to the South in order to build up the nation’s strength.
After the election, Sherman’s troops marched across Georgia in “Sherman’s March to Sea,” and burned much of Atlanta.
Sherman believed that striking at economic resources would help win the war. His troops slaughtered livestock, destroyed crops, and looted homes and businesses.
Eventually Confederate leaders were forced out of Richmond, and and Lee surrendered when he found his troops surrounded.
Lee and Grant met to negotiate terms of the Confederacy’s surrender, which were very generous for such a long and bitter conflict: Lee’s troops were to turn over their weapons and leave.
The North celebrated, but Lincoln’s assassination in 1865, before the official end of the war, changed the course of American history.

22. Reconstruction The Main Idea
Conflicting plans for dealing with the post-Civil War South had long-lasting effects on government and the economy.
Reading Focus
What were the differing plans for presidential Reconstruction?
What was congressional Reconstruction?
What happened when Radical Republicans took charge of Reconstruction?
Why did Reconstruction end, and what were its effects on American history?

23. Presidential Reconstruction
Lincoln’s Plan
In late 1863 Lincoln issued a Proclamation of Amnesty and Reconstruction, offering forgiveness to all southerners who pledged loyalty to the Union and supported emancipation.
Lincoln’s Ten-Percent Plan stated that once 10 percent of a southern state’s voters took the oath, they could organize a new state government, which had to ban slavery.
Lincoln’s Plan Sparks Debate in Congress
Some Congress members thought re-admitting states to the Union was only a power of Congress; some thought the South never officially left the union.
Others thought southern states should go through the same admission process for statehood as territories.
Congress Responds, Tragedy Strikes
Congress’ own plan, the Wade-Davis Bill, required a majority of a state’s white men to pledge the oath, not just 10 percent. It was vetoed by Lincoln.
Lincoln was assassinated by John Wilkes Booth in 1865, and didn’t live long enough to carry out his Reconstruction plans for the South.

24. Reactions in the South:
Johnson’s Plan
After Lincoln’s death, Vice President Andrew Johnson became president.
Though he was a Democrat, Republicans thought he would work with them because he didn’t seem as forgiving as Lincoln.
As a Tennessean from a poor family, Johnson didn’t dislike the South, just wealthy planters.
Johnson’s plan was similar to Lincoln’s, with a few changes.
The Reconstruction Plan:
Added wealthy southern men to the list of those who needed to be pardoned by government
Did not, according to Charles Sumner, Thaddeus Stevens, and other powerful members in Congress, provide any role in government for freedmen, or those freed from slavery
Was welcomed by white southerners, who could form state governments on their own terms
Reactions in the South:
Former Confederates took state offices and were sent to Congress.
The Black Codes were formed, keeping freedmen in a dependent position and providing cheap farm labor.
Private groups formed like the Ku Klux Klan, who enforced the Black Codes and terrorized African Americans and their supporters.

25. Congress Takes Control
Most northerners supported Johnson’s plan, until the Black Codes and the return of former Confederates to power upset them.
That strengthened Radical Republicans, who wanted a stronger Reconstruction program to reshape southern society politically and economically, and to help freedmen gain equality.
After Congress reconvened in 1866, moderate Republicans, who controlled both the House and the Senate, proposed two bills.
The first supported the Freedmen’s Bureau, an organization Congress created in 1865 to help former slaves and poor whites in the South. It allowed the bureau to build more schools and provide other aid.
The second bill was the Civil Rights Act of 1866, which gave African Americans citizenship and guaranteed them the same legal rights as white Americans.
Both bills passed in Congress, but Johnson’s veto led moderate Republicans to help Radical Republicans take over Reconstruction.

26. Radical Reconstruction
To protect the Civil Rights Act of 1866, Congress passed the Fourteenth Amendment, requiring states to grant citizenship to everyone born or naturalized in the United States and promising “equal protection of the laws.”
In the 1866 congressional elections, Radicals gained enough votes to take over Reconstruction, and passed four Reconstruction Acts
The acts set three conditions for readmission.
Ratify the Fourteenth Amendment
Write new state constitutions that guaranteed freedmen the right to vote
Form new governments to be elected by all male citizens
Congress also passed the Tenure of Office Act in 1867, requiring the Senate’s permission to remove any official it appointed.
When Johnson tested the act by firing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton, who supported Radical Republicans, the House voted to impeach him.
The Senate lacked one vote for the two-thirds majority they needed to remove Johnson from office.

27. Republicans in Charge
Republicans chose Civil War war hero Ulysses S. Grant as their candidate in the 1868 presidential election.
About half a million African American votes gave Grant the victory.
Congress passed the Fifteenth Amendment, protecting African American male voting rights.
As Congress took control of Reconstruction, discrimination slowed and the Black Codes were repealed.
White southerners who supported Reconstruction were called scalawags, or scoundrels, by ex-Confederates.
This varied group included farmers who wanted the wealthy class’s power, those ruined by the war, and business leaders who wanted to stop the South’s dependence on agriculture.
Northerners who came south to join in the region’s rebirth were called carpetbaggers.
They also came from varied backgrounds, including politicians, teachers, Freedmen’s Bureau officers and former soldiers.
Some were African Americans.

28. Freedom Brings Changes
Freedom meant African Americans could search for long-lost relatives, own land, and have jobs of their choice.
Many freedmen moved to urban areas, mainly in the South, but were met with prejudice and low pay.
Some went West, becoming business owners, miners, soldiers, or cowboys.
Freed slaves eagerly sought education. The Freedmen’s Bureau started more than 4,000 schools.
African Americans also established churches, created trade associations, fire companies, employment agencies, and mutual aid societies.

29. Economic Changes
For many freedmen, owning land meant freedom, but even those with money found landowners unwilling to sell to them and give them economic independence.
A new labor system gradually arose.
It was hard for tenant farmers and sharecroppers to rise out of poverty.
While the rural South suffered economic hardship, southern cities grew rapidly as railroads linked North and South.
Southern business leaders and northern investors joined to build mills and other ventures, but this did not help freedmen or poor southerners.
Sharecroppers received a share of their employers’ crops. The employer provided land, shelter, seeds, animals, and tools. The sharecropper provided labor.
Tenant farmers rented their land from landowners and could grow any crop. Many grew food crops, not cotton, to provide both food and income.

30. Reconstruction Ends Violence
Violence plagued the South during Reconstruction.
The KKK and similar groups terrorized minorities.
Terrorists targeted African American leaders and people of both races with burnings and violence.
They beat Freedmen’s Bureau teachers and murdered public officials, many of whom resigned.
When state governments couldn’t control violence, Congress passed Enforcement Acts that set penalties for trying to prevent a qualified citizen from voting.
The Acts also gave the army and federal courts the power to punish Klan members.
Discontent
Eventually, most people were unhappy with Reconstruction.
The army still had to keep the peace in the South, and the Republican government seemed ineffective.
African Americans were unhappy about their poverty and lack of land reform and all were discouraged by the South’s poor economy.
Some said Reconstruction governments were corrupt.
These conditions strengthened the Liberal Republicans, who broke party and helped Democrats win back Congress in 1872.

31. The Impact of Reconstruction
By the mid-1870s it was clear that Reconstruction was ending.
Its fiercest leaders, Thaddeus Stevens and Charles Sumner, had died.
Supreme Court decisions, such as the Slaughterhouse Cases, in which the Court said that most civil rights were under state control and not protected by the Fourteenth Amendment, weakened its protections.
As support for Reconstruction declined, southern Democratic leaders and supporters grew bolder.
Lawlessness and violence against Republican candidates increased, and some were murdered.
When Mississippi’s governor asked Ulysses S. Grant for help in 1875, he refused.
In the 1876 presidential election, Rutherford B. Hayes was given the presidency when Republicans promised to withdraw federal troops from the South, causing the collapse of Republican state governments.
Some called the post-Reconstruction South “the New South.”

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