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2nd Great Awakening/Rise of abolitionism
The movement began in 1790 and got grew in the 1800's and in 1820 membership grew rapidly between Baptist and Methodist churches. A series of religious revivals starting in 1801, based on Methodism and Baptism. Stressed a religious philosophy of salvation through good deeds and tolerance for all Protestant sects. The revivals attracted women, Blacks, and Native Americans. It also had an effect on moral movements such as prison reform, the temperance movement, and moral reasoning against slavery. -
Missouri Compromise
The issue was that Missouri wanted to join the Union as a slave state, therefore unbalancing the Union so there would be more slave states then free states. The compromise set it up so that Maine joined as a free state and Missouri joined as a slave state. Congress also made a line across the southern border of Missouri saying except for the state of Missouri, all states north of that line must be free states or states without slavery. -
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Reconstruction-Era of Crisis Timespan
The era of crisis took place from the 1820's to the 1860's -
Gag Resolution
This was an agreement that congress would not talk about the issue of slavery to avoid conflict in the government. It angered many Americans because they thought it was against their first amendment rights to discuss these issues.Prohibited debate or action on antislavery appeals; driven through the House by pro-slavery Southerners, the gag resolution passed every year for eight years, eventually overturned with the help of John Quincy Adams -
Election of 1844
Candidates: Henry Clay (Whigs- in an upset over Van Buren) and James Polk (Democrat). Polk favored expansion, demanded that Texas and Oregon be added to the US and Clay had already spoken out against annexation. Polk won the election by the difference of one state (NY, because some of its votes went to the Liberty Party candidate, losing Clay the state). -
Annexation of Texas
U.S. made Texas a state in 1845. Joint resolution - both houses of Congress supported annexation under Tyler, and he signed the bill shortly before leaving office
-part of John Tyler's presidential campaign. -
Mexican American War
The first half of the war was fought in northern Mexico near the Texas border, with the U.S. Army led by Zachary Taylor. The second half of the war was fought in central Mexico after U.S. troops seized the port of Veracruz, with the Army being led by Winfield Scott. Results: U.S. captured Mexico City, Zachary Taylor was elected president, Santa Ana abdicated, and Mexico ceded large parts of the West, including New Mexico, Colorado, Utah, Arizona, Nevada and California, to the U.S. -
Compromise of 1850
The Compromise of 1850 was an eight part compromise devised by Henry Clay in order to settle the land disputes between the North and South. As part of the compromise, California was admitted a free state, while a stricter Fugitive Slave Law was enforced. Slave trade was abolished in the District of Columbia, while slavery itself was not abolished and sectional peace returned to the northern and southern states for a few years. The issue of slavery eventually did lead to future conflicts. -
Creation of the Republican Party
Began in the 1850s, dedicated to keeping slavery out of the territories, but they championed a wider range of issues, including the further development of national roads, more liberal land distribution in the West, and increased protective tariffs. Comprised of Whigs, Northern Democrats, and Free-Soilers, in defiance to the Slave Powers. -
Kansas Nebraska Act
A compromise law in 1854 that suspended the Missouri Compromise and left it to voters in Kansas and Nebraska to determine whether they would be slave or free states. the law exacerbated sectional tensions when voters can to blows over the question of slavery in Kansas. It was very controversial, supported by President Pierce and not supported by Douglass. Set up Kansas and Nebraska as states. Popular sovereignty was used to decide about slavery. -
Bleeding Kansas
Continued until 1861. Kansas was being disputed for free or slave soil during 1854-1857, by popular sovereignty. In 1857, there were enough free-soilers to overrule the slave-soilers. So many people were feuding that disagreements eventually led to killing in Kansas between pro-slavery and anti-slavery forces. A sequence of violent events involving abolitionists and pro-Slavery elements that took place in Kansas Territory where new pro-slavery and antislavery constitutions competed. -
Dred Scott v. Sanford
On March 6, 1857 Taney made his decision on the Dred Scott case. A Missouri slave sued for his freedom, claiming that his four year stay in the northern portion of the Louisiana Territory made free land by the Missouri Compromise had made him free. The U.S, Supreme Court decided he couldn't sue in federal court because he was property, not a citizen. Stated slaves were not citizens: slaves were property no matter where they were living and the Missouri Compromise was unconstitutional. -
Lincoln Douglas Debates
These took place until October 15,1858. A series of seven debates. The two argued the important issues of the day like popular sovereignty, the Lecompton Constitution and the Dred Scott decision. Douglas won these debates, but Lincoln's position in these debates helped him beat Douglas in the 1860 presidential election. -
Election of 1860
Republican - Abraham Lincoln. Democrat - Stephan A. Douglas, John C. Breckenridge. Constitutional Union - John Bell. Issues were slavery in the territories (Lincoln opposed adding any new slave states). Lincoln, the Republican candidate, won because the Democratic party was split over slavery. As a result, the South no longer felt like it has a voice in politics and a number of states seceded from the Union.