Term
| What were the debates on slavery between the Illinois Republican and Democratic candidates for the U.S. Senate that occurred in seven towns from mid-August to mid-October 1858 known as? |
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Definition
| the Lincoln-Douglas debates |
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Term
| In the Lincoln-Douglas debates, what did Douglas accuse Lincoln of favoring, and what did Lincoln accuse Douglas of supporting? |
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Definition
| Douglas accused Lincoln of favoring social equality for blacks, though he was a fairly typical white Illinois man. Lincoln accused Douglas of favoring the spread of slavery, which was partially untrue. |
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Term
| What main characters appear in Uncle Tom's Cabin? |
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Definition
| an older slave named Uncle Tom (represents a Christ-like figure), an evil white overseer named Simon Legree, a slave woman named Eliza who found out her son was going to be sold away from her so she escaped with him across the Ohio, the plantation owner's daughter named Little Eva who was close to Uncle Tom but ended up dying |
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Term
| What are examples of how national organizations were breaking into sectional parts by 1860? |
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Definition
| The Methodist Church divided in 1844. The American Party split in 1855. The Presbyterian Church split in 1837. The Baptists separated in 1845. |
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Term
| What did John C. Calhoun argue in the debate preceding the Compromise of 1850? |
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Definition
| That the Constitution protected a person's right to property everywhere, that the states rights doctrine was a protection for minority rights, that the territories were the common properties of all the states, that Congress did not have the right to prohibit slavery in the territories. |
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Term
| Who made up the older generation of sectional leaders who played a final role in the debates of 1850? |
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Definition
| Henry Clay, Daniel Webster, and John C. Calhoun were old by the time they wrote the Compromise of 1850. |
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Term
| Why did the belief that there was a southern slave-owner conspiracy to make the entire country a slave country spread among Northerners in the 1850s? |
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Definition
| The South was very defensive in regard to slavery, demanding an equal number of slave and free states in the Senate, and calling for a veto on certain presidential candidates. |
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Term
| What does the emergence of the Free Soil Party in 1848 suggest in regard to its supporters? |
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Definition
| That they were advocating the rights of non-slaveholding whites - appealing to Northerners whether or not they were opposed to slavery. |
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Term
| What did Senator Seward of New York argue in regard to slavery? |
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Definition
| That slavery was morally wrong and intellectually subversive for the whole country. |
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Term
| What did Southerners argue in support of the slave system? |
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Definition
| That slavery promoted democracy by ensuring the vote to the qualified, that slavery was the economic engine that had created national prosperity, that slavery provided a lifelong net of paternalistic benevolence for the workers, and that slavery was a blessing to an inferior race. |
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Term
| What did the Compromise of 1850 include? |
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Definition
| That California would enter the Union as a free state and that other southwest territories would be settled by popular sovereignty. A stronger fugitive law was enacted, the slave trade was outlawed in Washington, D.C., and the Texas-New Mexico border dispute was settled when Texas ceded land to New Mexico and had its debts funded. |
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Term
| Which president died suddenly during the debate over the Compromise of 1850? |
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Definition
| Zachary Taylor was poisoned by non-pasteurized milk and cherries. |
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Term
| What law of 1850, promised in the Compromise of 1850, put the full authority of the federal government behind southern efforts to capture escaped slaves? |
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Definition
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Term
| What former slave was involved in the most famous case of failed resistance to the enforcement of the Fugitive Slave Law? |
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Definition
| Anthony Burns, who had escaped to Boston, where his owner found him. A biracial group of people stormed the courthouse protesting for Burns' freedom, but he was returned to the South against his will, radicalizing Northerners. |
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Term
| What impact did the Fugitive Slave Law have on blacks and on northern whites, and how rigorously did the federal government enforce it? |
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Definition
| The federal government enforced it very rigorously in an attempt to prevent the Civil War. The Fugitive Slave Law forced slaves to flee to Canada, as they were no longer safe in the North. It convinced many northern whites that slavery was morally evil. Captured slaves in the north were at the mercy of slave catchers because they had no right to defend themselves. |
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Term
| What was the Ostend Manifesto? |
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Definition
| A document composed by U.S. ambassadors to Spain, France, and Britain saying that the U.S. had no interest in taking Cuba. |
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Term
| The efforts of Commodore Matthew Perry led to an 1854 treaty that opened trade with what previously isolationist Asian nation? |
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Definition
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Term
| What legislation, sponsored by Stephen A. Douglas, in effect repealed the Missouri Compromise in return for southern support for a transcontinental railroad to be built west of Chicago? |
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Definition
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Term
| Who were the "border ruffians" ? |
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Definition
| people from Missouri who cast votes into Kansas to promote slavery. |
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Term
| To what does the term "Bleeding Kansas" refer? |
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Definition
| the violence and killing between the pro-slavery and anti-slavery forces that became open warfare in 1856. (including John Brown's decision to brutally murder five pro-slavery men) |
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Term
| Who were the Know-Nothings, and how did they get that name? |
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Definition
| They were American Party members who often belonged to secret Protestant fraternal societies. They were opposed to the Catholic Church because of its monarchy in the Papal States. They were referred to as the Know-Nothings because, when people asked them about their society, they would say "I know nothing." |
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Term
| What does the term Nativism refer to in the 1850s? |
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Definition
| the fear and hatred of immigrants |
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Term
| Why did the American Party develop? |
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Definition
| the breakup of the Whig Party, the idea that immigrants were responsible for rising crime rates, the belief that Catholics were against reform and also controlled by the Pope, the feeling that Irish immigrants supported the Democrats |
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Term
| Who were the presidential candidates in the 1856 election? |
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Definition
Republican: John C. Fremont
Know-Nothing: Millard Filmore
Democrat: James Buchanan |
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Term
| Why did James Buchanan become the Democratic Party's candidate in 1856? |
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Definition
| He had been our ambassador to Great Britain, so he was out of the country during the Kansas-Nebraska Act and therefore unable to take a public stance. Furthermore, his rural southern background carried much political support. |
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Term
| Why was the election of 1856 actually two elections? |
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Definition
| Some of the candidates were on the ballot in the North but not in the South. Most of the Southern states did not even have James Buchanan on the ballot. |
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Term
| Who beat Charles Sumner senseless on the Senate floor in 1856? |
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Definition
| Congressman Preston Brooks, who was provoked by Sumner's speech against Brooks' uncle. |
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Term
| What resulted from the Dred Scott decision? |
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Definition
| The court ruled that the Missouri Compromise was unconstitutional. (Dred Scott was a slave who was taken by his master into free territory, where he had two children and a wife. Years later, the master's widow ordered Scott to take the case to the Supreme Court in order to grant Scott legal freedom, but the plan backfired. Scott was declared a slave by the Supreme Court.) This decision raised northern fears that slavery would become the national norm. It urged southerners to believe that their position on slavery was the correct one. It ruled that the federal government could not regulate property between territories. Whew. |
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Term
| What was the state constitution of Kansas, under which the pro-slavery territorial government applied for admission to the Union in 1857, known as? |
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Definition
| the LeCompton Constitution (named after the town in which it was written) |
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Term
| What resulted from the application of the doctrine of popular sovereignty in Kansas? |
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Definition
| Kansas produced two territory governments and a bogus pro-slavery constitution. |
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Term
| What resulted from John Brown's raid on Harpers Ferry? |
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Definition
| made John Brown a martyr in the north, raised the greatest fear of southerners (slave rebellion), convinced many southerners that secession was the only possible response to these actions, caused the death of eight of Brown's men, led to the arrest and execution of Brown by hanging |
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Term
| Who were the elite "Secret Six" who provided John Brown with financial support? |
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Definition
| Theodore Parker, Thomas Wentworth Higginson, Samuel Ridley Howe, George Stearns, Franklin Sanborn, Gerrit Smith. |
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Term
| What did the Republican platform of 1860 include? |
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Definition
| federal government support for economic development, proposal to provide nearly free Western lands to free men (Homestead Act), the passage of a higher protective tariff to aid business, support for a transcontinental railroad. |
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Term
| What was the first state to secede on December 20, 1860? |
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Definition
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