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12-3: The nation comes apart - Coggle Diagram
12-3: The nation comes apart
Election of 1856
Nominating candidates
Democratic party (pro-slavery)
standard: no link to Bleeding Kansas.
James Buchanan
Pennsylvanian
Reason
There is no link between Bleeding Kansas
no abolitionist who would upset S
strength
Many Southerners favor him since he carried every slave state except Maryland in S.
Republican party / N wing of Know-Nothing party / anti-slavery
John C. Fremont
pathfinder of the W
conqueror of California
slogan : ‘free speech, free press, free soil, free men, Fremont’
Know-Nothing party
splitted by slavery issue over N & S
S : nominated Millard Fillmore
N: joined with the Republican party
the campaign became not national but sectional
Buchanan faced off against Fremont (North) and Fillmore (South) (S)
In the S, Fremont had received no electoral votes.
S saw the Republican Party as a devil's tool.
Some Southerners believe that if Fremont is elected, they should split from the Union.
result: James Buchanan won
Dred Scott V. Sanford 1857
Dred Scott (a slave who was not a United States citizen) spent time in Illinois (where slavery was prohibited by the Northwest Ordinance of 1787) and Minnesota (where slavery was prohibited by the Missouri Compromise) before returning to Missouri.
he sued for his freedom
Supreme Court's decision
Scott remained as a slave
He didn't have the right to sue because he wasn't a Missouri resident.
Justice should answer ‘was Scott a citizen and was he free?’
opinion of Roger B. Taney
‘was Scott a citizen?’ : black couldn’t be citizens
proof: Only white men drafted the constitution.
As a result, Scott was unable to file a lawsuit in court.
‘was he free?’ : no
evidence : the Missouri Compromise was unconstitutional
a slave was the property of his owner
The constitution does not provide Congress the authority to deprive slaves in territories of their owners.
Because Congress lacked the power to intervene in slavery, all states became slave states.
conclusion
Slavery could not be restricted or abolished by Congress until states applied.
S was ecstatic that the Supreme Court backed the pro-slavery stance.
Outraged, N pledged to overthrow the Supreme Court's ruling.
People like Stephen A. Douglas and others who aspired to abolish slavery by popular sovereignty were humiliated.
The Supreme Court exacerbated the nation's divisions and pushed the country closer to conflict.
They are tasked with resolving constitutional challenges.
the Lecompton constitution
A convention assembled in Lecompton to draft a constitution that would allow Kansas to join the Union as a state.
The majority of delegates supported slavery, and Free-Soilers declined to vote in the delegates' election.
Because the pro-slavery convention feared that their constitution would be rejected in a popular vote, they only allowed a vote on whether to keep slavery or abolish it:
'with slavery' refers to the unrestricted influx of slaves into Kansas.
'Without slavery,' no new slaves would be brought in, but 200 slaves who were already in Kansas would be kept.
result
With slavery, the Lecompton Constitution was adopted.
The majority of Kansas residents opposed slavery.
Pro-slavery groups are unable to prevent people from voting
Kansas' newly elected legislature presented the entire Lecompton Constitution to the people.
the Free-Soil vote was greater than the slavery vote
Douglas breaks with Buchanan
Despite the fact that Kansas residents rejected the Lecompton constitution, Buchanan petitioned Congress to recognize Kansas as a slave state.
Stephen A. Douglas
popular sovereignty was claimed
The government had no legal authority to impose slavery or freedom on anyone.
People in that area make their own decisions.
wanted a new constitution written in Kansas and put to a fair vote of the people.
With the Lecompton Constitution, Buchanan used all of his influence to try to get Kansas admitted as a state.
To defeat the Lecompton Constitution, Douglas teamed up with the Free-Soil Republicans.
result
Kansas remained a territory until the Civil War ended
Kansas is recognized as a free state in 2/29/1861
Lincoln-Douglas debates 1858
Abraham Lincoln:
Slavery-free zones should be preserved.
He put it down to the Dred Scott judgment.
Douglas
In his own policy of popular sovereignty, he compared democracy, Americanism, and justice.
The disputes reached a climax
'Can the people of a region lawfully exclude slavery before they become a state?' Lincoln wondered.
Douglas was torn between two options when it came to answering this question.
Douglas' Freeport Doctrine made him a lot of enemies in the South, which is why so many Southerners back Lincoln.
John Brown’s raid, Harpers Ferry 1859
John Brown
the perpetrator of the Kansas Pottawatomie Massacre
He made the decision to attack the South by arming the slaves and allowing them to fight for their freedom.
He and his followers seized the US armory in October 1859, then attacked planters to forcibly free 30 slaves.
Irony: the first person they killed was a black man who was already free.
Brown and his companions were hanged on the gallows or slain during repression when Virginia rose out against the invasion.
effect
Brown's death inspires a thousand people to stake their lives in the fight against slavery.
In the eyes of many, Brown was an abolitionist who was backed by the Black Republican Party.