The Civil War

1. The Civil War A timeline of events, 1850 - 1861

2. Origins of the war 1850 - 1861

3. The Compromise of 1850 • California entered the Union as a free state. • The Slave Trade in Washington, D.C. was abolished – slavery remained legal, though. • The territories of Utah and New Mexico would determine the slavery issue by popular sovereignty. • The Fugitive Slave Law would be strictly enforced.

4. The Fugitive Slave Law The Fugitive Slave law was a part of the Constitution from the very beginning. In order to protect Southern property rights, the Constitution stipulated that it was the obligation of all citizens to help capture and return any runaway slaves. On aspect of the Compromise of 1850 was a tightening of the requirements for Northern states to round up and return any runaway slaves in their states. The change in enforcement went over very poorly!

5. Abolitionism William Lloyd Garrison, the editor or The Liberator, proclaimed, “I AM aware that many object to the severity of my language; but is there not cause for severity? I will be as harsh as Truth, and as uncompromising as Justice. On this subject I do not wish to think, or speak, or write, with moderation. No! No! Tell a man whose house is on fire to give a moderate alarm; tell him to moderately rescue his wife from the hands of the ravisher; tell the mother to gradually extricate her babe from the fire into which it has fallen—but urge me not to use moderation in a cause like the present. I am in earnest—I will not equivocate—I will not excuse—I will not retreat a single inch—and I will be heard. The apathy of the people is enough to make every statue leap from its pedestal and hasten the resurrection of the dead.”

6. Violence against Abolitionism William Lloyd Garrison’s abolitionist paper The North Star had been put to press in 1831. Others would follow, and all provoked criticism and hostility from pro-slavery men. In 1837, fellow abolitionist Elijah Lovejoy was murdered by an angry mob in Alton, Illinois. The House of Representatives used a “gag rule” to prevent the consideration of any abolitionist proposals or resolutions. As the abolitionist movement became more “mainstream” over the next two decades, rhetoric only became more divisive.

7. Uncle Tom’s Cabin, by Harriet Beecher Stowe The 1852 publication of Uncle Tom’s Cabin, by Harriet Beecher Stowe, caused a national – and indeed an international stir. The book sold hundreds of thousands of copies. In the end, the Northerner Simon Legree brutally beats the loyal slave Tom to death – implying to the audience that the North is complicit in the crime.

8. The Kansas-Nebraska Act Passed in 1854 after Stephen Douglas used all of his political capital to open the territories to settlement, this act opened both Nebraska and Kansas to settlement. Douglas wanted for the route towards a transcontinental railroad to be cleared; as a part of the bargain, he insisted that the territories be allowed to settle the issue of slavery in the West by popular sovereignty. The act, therefore, overturned the Missouri Compromise of 1820, and invalidated the Missouri Compromise line of 36° 30’.

9. “bleeding Kansas” When the Kansas-Nebraska Act was passed into law, Northern abolitionists sought to populate the state with anti-slavery men. Meanwhile, pro-slavery “border ruffians” came across from Missouri to have their own influence on the outcome of events. Soon, violence erupted – on a small scale – across Kansas. By 1859, over 50 people had been killed by one side or the other, including a number of gruesome acts of violence. One of the instigators in this period was John Brown.

10. Preston brooks – Charles Sumner

11. Pottawatomie creek At Pottawatomie Creek in Kansas, John Brown and several of his sons literally hacked five proslavery men to death with broadswords. Brown would escape, come back to Virginia, and plan out an attack on the arsenal at Harper’s Ferry in 1858. Although “Bleeding Kansas” received all the press coverage of a full fledged war over slavery, the bulk of the stories were rehashed or exaggerated. This wasn’t!

12. The Republican party With the slow dissolution of the Whig Party in the United States, several fragmented groups – the Know-Nothings, Anti-Masons, and a host of free-soil advocates would come together under the Republican Party’s banner. The first candidate to run for President was John C. Fremont – the California explorer and Senator. He had only middling success, but the party made strides nationwide over the next four years, so that when Lincoln was nominated in 1860, his was a formidable candidacy. Note the campaign slogan: “Free Territory, Free Speech, Free Press, Free Men – Fremont.”

13. The Dred Scott decision In the case of Dred Scott V. Sandford, the Supreme Court ruled that enslaved African-Americans, and even free African Americans had no rights that white men were bound to respect. Not only was Scott’s request for freedom turned down, but also, the court ruled that Southern slaveholders had the right to bring their “property” anywhere they chose. Essentially, slavery declared legal in all states.

14. The Lincoln-Douglas Debates The 1858 Senate contest in Illinois featured two candidates who articulated opposing views on slavery. Douglas, who favored the notion of popular sovereignty, argued that slavery was an issue which should be determined based on democratic principles. Lincoln, on the other hand, contended that slavery as an institution made a mockery of our democracy, and that it must not be extended into the West – metaphorically, the future.

15. John Brown – Harper’s Ferry After leading an attack on the federal arsenal at Harper’s Ferry, Virginia, Brown was arrested, imprisoned, and sentenced to death. The mission was a disaster, and produced no slave revolt as he had hoped. When he was executed, Southern church bells rang rejoicing at his demise. Meanwhile, to the north, his life was celebrated as a martyr. It was becoming increasingly clear that the only solution to the quickening conflict was, as Brown related, “to purge this land with blood.”

16. The doughface Presidents

17. The Election of Lincoln - 1860 The Election of 1860 featured four candidates: Lincoln, the Republican; Stephen Douglas, the Democrat; John Bell of the Constitutional Union Party – a group of reformed Whigs; and John Breckenridge, the “Southern Democrat.” With the popular vote thus divided, Lincoln was able to score an Electoral College triumph. This, despite the fact that he was not even on the ballot in several states.

18. South Carolina “South Carolina is too small to be a nation – and too large to be an insane asylum.” Upon hearing the Lincoln’s candidacy had proven triumphant, the state of South Carolina seceded from the Union. It was December of 1860. When South Carolina resolved to leave the union, they left alone, but soon thereafter six other states followed. Buchanan did nothing. Lincoln, when he assumed power, resolved to restore the Union.

19. The secession Crisis

20. James Buchanan Lincoln would not be sworn into office until March 4, 1861. As seven states announced their intention to dissolve the Union and secede, James Buchanan did virtually nothing. Lincoln’s inheritance was as nation already divided. Lincoln viewed secession as the ultimate destruction of any democracy, and vowed that the nation must be restored. Although he would not threaten war, his intentions were clear.

21. Lincoln’s inaugural One section of our country believes slavery is right and ought to be extended, while the other believes it is wrong and ought not to be extended. This is the only substantial dispute. The fugitive-slave clause of the Constitution and the law for the suppression of the foreign slave trade are each as well enforced, perhaps, as any law can ever be in a community where the moral sense of the people imperfectly supports the law itself. The great body of the people abide by the dry legal obligation in both cases, and a few break over in each. This, I think, can not be perfectly cured, and it would be worse in both cases after the separation of the sections than before. The foreign slave trade, now imperfectly suppressed, would be ultimately revived without restriction in one section, while fugitive slaves, now only partially surrendered, would not be surrendered at all by the other. Physically speaking, we can not separate. We can not remove our respective sections from each other nor build an impassable wall between them. A husband and wife may be divorced and go out of the presence and beyond the reach of each other, but the different parts of our country can not do this. They can not but remain face to face, and intercourse, either amicable or hostile, must continue between them. Is it possible, then, to make that intercourse more advantageous or more satisfactory after separation than before? Can aliens make treaties easier than friends can make laws? Can treaties be more faithfully enforced between aliens than laws can among friends? Suppose you go to war, you can not fight always; and when, after much loss on both sides and no gain on either, you cease fighting, the identical old questions, as to terms of intercourse, are again upon you.

22. The upper SOuth States in the so-called Upper South were more interdependent with the Northern states and their industries. The powerful logic behind seceding in order to preserve the slave system simply did not resonate as well in these areas; yet, each state came gradually to the conclusion that the federal governments had overstep it’s bounds. For Virginia, Lincoln’s calling up of 75,000 soldiers in order to put down the insurrection in South Carolina was sufficient.

23. Border states The smoking gun evidence which verifies that it was not Abraham Lincoln’s intention – at the start of the conflict, anyway – to end the institution of slavery are the border states. Four states which remained in the Union, despite allowing slavery.

24. Lincoln’s cabinet Although a handful of Lincoln’s men – like William Seward would become strong abolitionists, most were moderates.

25. The goals of the war • At the start of the conflict, Lincoln sought to reunify the Union. Secession was not constitutional, and it was his intention to bring the Confederacy back into the United States. • Lincoln made no statements regarding the abolition of slavery during the opening year of the war. • It was not until the Battle of Antietam Creek – in the autumn of 1862, that the Emancipation Proclamation was issued. • It was only then that the abolition of slavery became the central focus of the conflict.