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Events that led to the American Civil War
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The Wilmot Proviso
The Wilmot Proviso was a legislative proposal by David Wilmot towards the end of the Mexican War. This proposal would outlaw slavery in any of the territories acquires by this war. Although it never passes, the discussions of this bill included the first serious conversations of secession. -
After the Mexican War
After the Mexican war, the United States was given western territories, however as these territories became states, they were not declared free or slave states. To handle the dispute Congress passed the Compromise of 1850. The terms of this declared California a free state, and gave popular sovereignty to the people of Utah and New Mexico, allowing them to decide if their state will be free or slave. -
The Fugitive Slave Act
Other terms of the Compromise of 1850 included the Fugitive Slave Act. This act required the all runaway slaves to be returned to the South. This was an issue because police and ¨kidnappers¨ could take any black person and call them a slave, and when they went to court for trial, the accused individual was not allowed to speak or have an attorney. This took the rights away from free black slaves, causing some northern states to implement personal liberty laws and increase citizen rights. -
Uncle Toms Cabin
Uncle Tom's Cabin was a novel written by Harriet Beecher Stowe, an abolitionist with intentions to show the evils of slavery. Her novel became a best seller and had an immense impact on the northerners views on slavery. -
Bleeding Kansas
Bleeding Kansas is a term describing the violence during the settling of Kansas. The Kansas-Nebraska used popular sovereignty in deciding if the new state should be slave or free, rejecting the Missouri Compromise's line of latitude as a slave boundary. This caused pro-slave and anti-slave settlers to flood into Kansas trying to influence the vote. As both views fought for control, violence broke out, hence the title Bleeding Kansas. -
Dred Scott Case
Dred Scott, a black man, went to trial arguing that he should be free because he had been held as a slave while in a free state. The Court ruled against him because he did not hold any property. They also stated although his owner brought him to a free state, he was still a slave because slaves are considered peoperty to their owners. This decion by the Court caused abolitionists to increase their efforts against slavery. -
Rejection of the Lecompton Constitiution
In 1857, the Lecompton Constitution was created and would allow Kansas to be a slave state. Pro-slavery people along with President James Buchanan pushed the Constitution to the Congress. However, it was rejected in 1858 and sent back to Kansas for a vote. Kansas voters also rejected the Constitution and Kansas became a free state -
John Brown's raid on Harper's Ferry
John Brown was an abolitionist who was active in the violence in Kansas. In October 1859, he led a group of seventeen including five black members to raid the weapons arsenal in Harper's Ferry, Virginia. After capturing several buildings, his numbers were soon killed or arrested by Col. Robert E. Lee. Brown was tried and hanged for treason. This was another large event in the abolitionist movement. -
1860 Presidential Election
South Carolina warned that if Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860, they would secede from the Union. After his victory, South Carolina along with six other states seceded and became the Confederate States of America. Lincoln agreed with his Republican party that the South was becoming too powerful and Congress should not admit slavery into any new territories or states of the Union. -
Secession of Southern States
After the 1860 presidential election of republican Abraham Lincoln, southern states seceded into the Confederate States of America. His anti-slavery influence caused issues in the South, because they had an agricultural economy in which crops were grown and harvested by slaves.
