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Wilmot's Proviso
David Wilmot was not anti-slavery for moral reasons, but wanted it outlawed to allow for new jobs in California and New Mexico territories without the competition of free slave labor. The House of Representatives, dominated by the more populous North, passed the Proviso again and again but the Senate was equally divided between slave and free states and never passed it. This would have granted the Federal government immense power, but Southern states fought tirelessly to maintain control. -
Dred Scott Decision
Dred Scott was a slave who appealed to the Supreme Court, suing for his freedom. First, the court decided that African Americans were not citizens thus they couldn't testify in court. Second, the federal government could not ban slavery from any territory because the 5th amendment prohibits the state to seize property without due process. Thus, the Missouri Compromise was illegal and exempt. The decision outraged Northerners who favored heightened federal control. -
Fugitive Slave Acts
The Fugitive Slave Acts were passed to appease the South, forcing runaway slaves north of the Mason-Dixon Line to be returned to their owners, meaning that reaching the North was no longer the goal for freedom. Now, slaves had to flee all the way to Canada. This was a federal act that protected slavery, but abolitionists in the North rarely followed the law and it was scarcely enforced. -
The Kansas-Nebraska Act
The Kansas-Nebraska Act continued to divide the country, literally and figuratively. Senator Douglas wanted Nebraska made a territory, so he proposed Kansas as a Southern state that would be inclined to become a slave state. Kansas was north of the Missouri Compromise border, so the act was the final straw to repealing of the compromise, opening all states to Popular Sovereignty. The Whig party split, Southern Whigs joining the Democrat party and Northern Whigs forming the Republican Party. -
Bleeding Kansas
Following the dissipation of the Missouri Compromise, Bleeding Kansas erupted with politically motivated violence. People migrated from Missouri to Kansas to fraudulently vote pro-slavery; Kansas was admitted as a slave state against the will of the legal residents. Kansas residents rejected the legislature and formed their own anti-slavery government. Border Ruffians marched in to the Free-Soil government, destroying everything in their path. Anti-slavery residents retaliated with massacres. -
Raid on Harper's Ferry
John Brown, the anti-slavery religious man who had murdered five people in a pro-slavery town in Kansas, organized the raid and capture of an arsenal at Harper's Ferry in Virginia. He was relying on the support of slaves to organize a massive uprising but very few showed up. Although the raid failed and Brown was captured, it proved the South's fears that the North was attempting to end slavery. -
Abraham Lincoln's Election
Republican candidate Abraham Lincoln won the 1860 election. He was morally opposed to the institution of slavery, but promised not to abolish slavery from where it currently existed, even though he wanted to contain it and prevent its expansion to new states. Nevertheless, the South was terrified that the new president would push for abolition, which they saw as a violation of state rights. Two days after his election South Carolina became the first state to secede. -
Emancipation Proclamation
Abraham Lincoln was morally opposed to slavery, but the proclamation was not complete abolition, nor was it for ethical reasons. Rather, it was heavily strategic. It prevented foreign countries from publicly supporting the Confederacy, and encouraged border states to stay loyal to the Union by permitting them slaves. It increased the power of the federal government and diminished the possibility of outside aid for the South.
