Period 5 (1848-1877)
Jacob Whitt January 4, 2016
Union in Peril (1848-1861)
Popular Sovereignty
- Legitimacy of state based on the will and consent of the people
- Lewis Cass gained support from moderates who agreed that slavery should be handled by a vote of people rather than Congress
The Compromise of 1850
- Admitted California into the Union as a free state
- Utah and New Mexico to be decided based on popular sovereignty
- Settled land dispute between Texas and New Mexico
- Adoption of a new Fugitive Slave Law
Kansas-Nebraska Act/"Bleeding Kansas"
- Kansas-Nebraska Act repealed Missouri Compromise and caused rising conflicts over slavery
- Allowed slavery to be decided in the Nebraska Territory by popular sovereignty
- "Bleeding Kansas" referred to the massive violence between pro-slavery supporters and abolitionists following the Kansas-Nebraska Act
Dred Scott v. Sandford
- Scot had been a slave in Missouri and then taken to free Wisconsin and lived there for two years
- Scot argued that his residence on free soil granted him citizenship
- Supreme Court decided against Scot
- Decision delighted Southern Democrats and served as a basis for future trials of similar nature
Secession of the Deep South
- Lincoln's election in 1860 caused Southern secessionists to take drastic measures
- South Carolina led by seceding from the Union on December of 1860
- Georgia, Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Texas followed South Carolina during a 6 week period
- The Confederate States of America formed in February of 1861
Slavery - Crash Course US History #13
POL-2 (Reform Movements)
- Reform Movements, with abolition in particular, further sparked conflicts between Northerners and Southerners and fueled sectionalism
NAT-3 (National Identity)
- Secession and the formation of the Confederate States of America caused a lasting change of identity for the United States even after the readmission of confederate states
- Even today, conflicts began in the Civil War period continue to shape American identity