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Underground Railroad
A network of clandestine routes and safe houses established in the United States during the early- to mid-18th century. It was used by enslaved African Americans primarily to escape into free states and Canada. -
Pro & Anti Slave Literature
Poetry that depicted the life of the slave and became a political tool which the moral suasionists used effectively to sway sentiment toward their position. -
Mexican-American War
An armed conflict between the United States and Mexico from 1846 to 1848. It followed the 1845 American annexation of Texas, which Mexico considered its territory. -
Compromise of 1850
a series of measures passed by the U.S. Congress in an effort to settle regional disagreements over the state of American slavery. The conflict involved the admission of new states and territories to the U.S.—and, more specifically, whether they would be admitted as “free” or “slave” states. -
Fugitive Slave Law
Was part of the Compromise of 1850. The act required that slaves be returned to their owners, even if they were in a free state. The act also made the federal government responsible for finding, returning, and trying escaped slaves. -
Bleeding Kansas
A series of violent civil confrontations in Kansas Territory, and to a lesser extent in western Missouri. It emerged from a political and ideological debate over the legality of slavery in the proposed state of Kansas -
Republican Party Establishment
The Party began as a coalition of anti-slavery Conscience Whigs such as Zachariah Chandler and Free Soilers such as Salmon P. Chase. The first anti-Nebraska local meeting where "Republican" was suggested as a name for a new anti-slavery party was held in a Ripon, Wisconsin schoolhouse -
Kansas-Nebraska Act (1854)
Repealed the Missouri Compromise, created two new territories and allowed for popular sovereignty. It also produced a violent uprising known as “Bleeding Kansas,” as pro-slavery and antislavery activists flooded into the territories to sway the vote. -
Dred Scott v Sandford
An enslaved Black man named Dred Scott and his wife, Harriet, sued for their freedom in St. Louis Circuit Court. They claimed that they were free due to their residence in a free territory where slavery was prohibited. The odds were in their favor -
Sumner-Brooks Incident
Occurred in the United States Senate chamber, when Representative Preston Brooks, a pro-slavery Democrat from South Carolina, used a walking cane to attack Senator Charles Sumner, an abolitionist Republican from Massachusetts. -
Panic of 1857
A financial panic in the United States caused by the declining international economy and over-expansion of the domestic economy. Because of the invention of the telegraph by Samuel F. Morse in 1844, the Panic of 1857 was the first financial crisis to spread rapidly throughout the United States. -
Lincoln-Douglas Debates
A series of seven debates between Abraham Lincoln, the Republican Party candidate for the United States Senate from Illinois, and incumbent Senator Stephen Douglas, the Democratic Party candidate. -
Lecompton Constitution
A pro-slavery document. If approved it would allow slavery in the state of Kansas. Both the proslavery constitutional convention and the free-state legislature claimed to have the authority to call for an election on the Lecompton Constitution. -
John Brown’s Raid
An effort by abolitionist John Brown to initiate a slave revolt in Southern states by taking over the United States arsenal at Harpers Ferry, Virginia. It has been called the dress rehearsal for, or Tragic Prelude to the Civil War. -
Election of 1860
Lincoln won the election and had more electoral votes and popular votes than any candidate.
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