Slavery , the Civil War, and Reconstruction By : Emma La Rocca

Slavery Divides The Country Slavery is part of a larger issue – the economy. The south uses slave labor to help grow most of the crops they sell. The work in Northern factories is done largely by immigrants.

THE ABOLITION MOVEMENT Newspapers and books play an important role in getting people to join the movement to end slavery. Yet their fight is not easy.

THE ELECTION OF 1860 Abraham Lincoln promises to end the spread of slavery . When Lincoln wins the election of 1860, one by one Southern states gradually leave the Union to form their own country, the Confederate States of America.

“KING COTTON” AND THE SPREAD OF SLAVERY In 1854 , there were more than 400,000 immigrants in the United States. It was cotton grown on large plantations that produced most of the South’s wealth. Some supporters of slavery argued that enslaved people In the South were better off than immigrants and other workers in the North.

In 1808, Congress made it illegal to import slaves from Africa. One of the most serious slave rebellions took place on August 21, 1831. Nat Turner led a small band of enslaved people in Southampton County. For 2 days they went from farm to farm and killed more than 60 people. Some states passed laws forbidding Africans from gathering in public places and holding religious services. One of the people who spoke out against slavery was Frederick Douglass.

Free Blacks There were free blacks in both the North and the South, especially in the cities where their were more chances of finding work. In the South they had to carry certificates of freedom, register with the police, and sometimes pay a tax. They were forced to sit in separate sections in white churches. And they were still denied equal legal and voting rights. On July 16, 1854, Elizabeth Jennings climbed aboard a white only streetcar in New York. After a struggle, a police officer removed her.

In the early 1800s, New York became a center for the movement to end slavery. By 1825 Seneca Village was a fairly large community of black property owners. Weeksville was established in Brooklyn in 1838, as a home to ministers , teachers , and other black professionals.

Speaking Out Against Slavery An abolitionist was someone who wanted to end, or abolish slavery in the United States. By 1860 about 17 newspapers for black readers were printed in the United States. In some places of The Liberator were burned and mail carriers refused to deliver it. William Lloyd Garrison demanded that blacks have the rights as whites.

The most famous abolitionist newspaper grew to be The North Star, started by Frederick Douglass in 1847. Harriet Beecher Stowe wrote a novel called Uncle Tom’s Cabin. It described the lives of the enslaved. Angelina Grimke and Sara Grimke daughters of a wealthy South Carolina judge and plantation owner.

Escaping Slavery Songs were often used to signal their plan to escape. Many African Americans risked their lives to escape to the free Northern states. Neither underground nor a railroad, the Underground Railroad was a system of secret routes that escaping captives followed to freedom. Songs were often used to signal their plan to escape. A Quaker from Indiana, Levi Coffin, was known as the president of the Underground Railroad.

One of the best known volunteers on the Underground Railroad was Harriet Tubman. Tubman fled from the plantation in the middle of the night. Tubman returned 19 times to guide her family and many others to freedom.

Abolition and Women’s Rights In 1848, abolitionists Lucretia Mott, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and three other women met in Seneca Falls, New York. On July 19, 1848, more than 240 people attended the Seneca Falls Convention. Throughout the 1840s and 1850s Sojourner Truth gave speeches around the country about abolition and women’s rights

Heading Toward War In 1850 the United States had 15 free states and 15 slave states. Then California asked to join the United States as a free state. Henry Clay came up with a solution, known as the Compromise of 1850. It allowed California into the Union as a free state. The North agreed to allow the territories of New Mexico and Utah to decide for themselves whether or not to allow slavery.