CAUSES OF THE CIVIL WAR

The Missouri Compromise

In 1819, 11 states permitted slavery and 11 did not, but when slaveholding Missouri asked to join the Union this balance became unstable again.

Speaker of the House Henry Clay thought he had a solution and he proposed the Missouri Compromise which would allow Missouri’s admittance as a slave state while simultaneously admitting Maine as a free state.

The Compromise also prohibited slavery in the remainder of the Louisiana Purchase north of 36-30N latitude.

THE MISSOURI COMPROMISE

The Compromise of 1850

• After the Mexican-American War, we again had issues of how to admit states. Henry Clay again came up with a compromise:

– California would be admitted as a free state

– New Mexico territory would have no restriction on slavery.

– The slave trade, but not slavery itself, would be abolished in the District of Columbia (Washington D.C).

– A stronger fugitive (runaway) slave law that

was criticized in Harriet Beecher Stowes,

Uncle Tom’s Cabin.

THE COMPROMISE OF 1850

Kansas-Nebraska Act

– In 1854 Stephen Douglas proposes that “popular sovereignty” should be how the slavery issue should be decided in new territories.

– The law passed, overturning the Missouri Compromise.

– The act led to bloodshed in Kansas when it was time to vote.

– Critics of the act formed a new political party, The Republicans. They wanted to let slavery continue in the South, but not extend it to any new territories.

Kansas-Nebraska Act

The Dred Scott Decision

Dred Scott was a slave who had followed his master throughout his travels from slave to Free State until his master had died. After his master died, Scott sued in court for his freedom because he felt he should be free since he had once lived on free soil.

The Court’s decided that Dred Scott was still a slave and also that Congress had no power to prohibit slavery in any territory. Knowing this they found the Missouri Compromise to be unconstitutional and so, too, popular sovereignty: where each new state could vote if it wanted slavery or not. All in all this decision meant that the Constitution protected slavery.

THE DRED SCOTT DECISION

The Nation Splits Apart

The election of 1860 proved to be one that could divide the nation in two. Abraham Lincoln won in a close race, yet his victory would be short lived, soon after the union he became president of quickly disintegrated.

On December 20, 1860, South Carolina held a special convention and voted to secede and by February 1861, Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Florida, and Georgia joined in secession as well.

Calling themselves the Confederate States of America the delegates from these states met in Montgomery, AL to form a new nation and government, they chose Jefferson Davis as their president. Southerners justified secession with the theory of states’ rights - the states had voluntarily joined the Union so they could voluntarily leave.

THE SOUTH SECEEDS

THE CIVIL WAR BEGINS…