1. The Nation Breaking Apart: Causes of the Civil War 1846-1861
“The state of Ohio is separated from Kentucky just by one river; on either side of it the soil is equally fertile, and the situation is equally favorable, and yet everything is different. Here [on the Ohio side] a population devoured by feverish activity, trying every means to make its fortune…There [on the Kentucky side] are people who make others work for them and show little compassion, a people without energy, mettle or the spirit of enterprise…These differences cannot be attributed to any other cause but slavery.”
-Alexis de Tocqueville, Journey to America

2. Differences Between the North and South
Agricultural Economy
Slaves
Defended slavery and the need for slave labor
Industrial and Agricultural Economy
Immigrants
Abolition Movement

3. Missouri Compromise of 1820
A slave state or a free state?
There was heated debate Congress
Southerners claimed the Constitution did not give Congress the power to ban slavery.

4. …The Missouri Compromise
Henry Clay’s Plan
The speaker of the House came up with a compromise.
Admit Missouri as a slave state and Maine [also wanted statehood] as a free state.
The Balance of power between the states would stay equal.
A line (drawn across the southern border of Missouri) would separate the free from slave territory to eliminate further debate.
…The Missouri Compromise

5. Controversy over Territories
The Wilmot Proviso was a bill that would outlaw slavery in land gained by the war with Mexico.
Southerners claimed it was unconstitutional
The bill did not pass but gave way to the Free Soil Party whose motto was “Free Soil, Free Speech, Free Labor, and Free Men.”

6. Compromise of 1850 California wanted to be added as a free state
Power would not be balanced in Congress
Henry Clay came up with a compromise and Stephen Douglass got it passed

7. Stephen Douglass
Henry Clay

8. The Parts of the Compromise
California would be a free state
The slave trade would be abolished in Washington, D.C.
Congress would pass no laws about slavery for the land won from Mexico
There would be a stronger Fugitive Slave Law

10. Uncle Tom’s Cabin
Angered by the Fugitive Slave Act, Harriet Beecher Stowe, wrote a book about a slave named Tom and his treatment under three different owners.
The book was popular in the North
Southerners thought the book showed the South and slavery in an untrue light
Many more people became aware of the ills of slavery and were opposed to it.

11. Kansas-Nebraska Act Stephen A. Douglass
Divide the Nebraska Territory into Kansas and Nebraska
If slavery should be allowed or not would be settled by popular sovereignty

13. “Bleeding Kansas”
Proslavery and antislavery settlers raced to the Kansas Territory to vote on the permission of slavery into the area
Illegal voters from Missouri would come vote during election time
Proslavery voters won but the antislavery voters rejected the government and made their own
Mobs attacked opposing sides destroying property and even committing murder.
John Brown was part of the antislavery mob whose attack is known as the Pottawatomie
Massacre.

14. Violence in Congress May 1856
Senator Charles Sumner (MASS) gave a speech attacking and insulting the proslavery groups in Kansas
The speech made fun of Senator A.P. Butler (SC)whose nephew, Preston Brook’s, was present
Brook’s attacked Sumner by hitting him over 30 times with his cane
The North and South were driven further apart

15. Republican Party Forms as a result of the Kansas-Nebraska Act
Many blame the violence on the Democratic Party
Northern Whigs join other opponents of slavery
Strong in the North

16. Dred Scott v. Sandford Dred Scott was taken from Missouri
to free territory and then back by his
owner.
Since he lived in free territory he sued for his freedom.
Chief Justice Taney handed down the Supreme Court verdict :
Dred Scott is not a U.S. citizen
Dred Scott cannot sue in U.S. courts
As a resident of Missouri he is subject to their slave codes

17. Lincoln Douglass Debates, 1858 The campaign for the Illinois Senate seat through a series of several debates dealing with the country’s most pressing issue: slavery, and became a model for political debates
Abraham Lincoln
Republican
“Slavery is a moral, a social, and a political wrong”
Slavery should not spread
Stephen Douglass
Democrat
Thought slavery was morally wrong
The issue of slavery should be left to the people (popular sovereignty)

18. John Brown’s Raid on Harper’s Ferry
Virginia, 1859
John Brown, a radical abolitionist, and his followers tried to start a slave rebellion that would spread throughout the South.
Unsuccessful
They were captured and John Brown was hanged.
“I, John Brown, am now quite certain that the crimes of this guilty land will never be purged away, but with blood.”

19. Election of 1860 Candidate Abraham Lincoln Stephen Douglass
John Breckenridge
John Bell
Political party
Republican
Northern Democrat
Southern Democrat
Constitutional Union
Electoral vote
180 12 72 38
Popular vote
8,865,593
1,382,713
848,356
592,906
Support
North
South
Views on slavery
Extreme- opposed expansion
Moderate- pass no laws
Extreme- gov’t protect in any territory

20. Secession
According to southerners, the idea of states’ rights, meant that because they joined the Union voluntarily they could also had the right to leave.
12/20/1860 South Carolina was first, then Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, and
Texas, seceded (11 total)
Confederate States of
America
President Jefferson Davis

21. North’s Response Secession is unconstitutional Lincoln:
He would not abolish slavery
He would not tolerate secession
“We are not enemies, but friends…”

22. All of these events led to the North and South drifting further apart eventually resulting in the Civil War