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3/5 Compromise
Debate at the Constitutional Convention over how slaves should be counted towards representation. North did not want the slaves to count. South wanted all of the slaves to count. 3 out of every 5 slaves would count towards representation in the House of Representatives.It was a temporary solution. It was a temporary solution. As the US expanded they would have to deal with admitting more states which could be adding more slave states into the Union -
Missouri Compromise
Missouri wanted to enter the Union as a slave state. the South wanted to keep slavery as a way of life on their plantations. The North, believed that was unnecessary and morally wrong. One way the government tried to limit the tension was by keeping the number of slave and free states equal. The Missouri Compromise seemed to solve the problem by admitting Missouri as a slave state and Maine as a free state, keeping the number of free and slave states equal. -
Abolition Movements
Early abolitionists movements starts 1830's to 1860's, wanted slavery to be gradually phased out. These abolitionist movements stop slave trade into U.S ends in 1808, it phase out slavery in North and the upper South-North bans slavery. -
Election of 1848
Democrat Party: Split over the issue of slavery into
Free Soil Party: opposed to slavery in western territories.
Whig Party: People of the territory decided the issue of slavery in the territory.
Whig Party splits into Northern & Southern Whigs forming the Republican party. -
Compromise of 1850
The United States had recently acquired a vast territory, the result of its war with Mexico. The North was feared continued expansion of slavery and the South wanted slavery to expand and did not believe Congress had the right to ban the expansion of slavery. California would be admitted as a free state. To pacify slave-state politicians, who would have objected to the imbalance created by adding another free state, the Fugitive Slave Act was passed. -
Fugitive Slave Act
Law-enforcement officials everywhere now had a duty to arrest anyone suspected of being a runaway slave on no more evidence than a slave owner's sworn testimony that they owned the runaway. Many Northern states wanted to circumvent the Fugitive Slave and Southern states insisted that escaped slaves be returned to them. Passage of the Fugitive Slave Act made abolitionists all the more resolved to put an end to slavery. -
Kansas-Nebraska Act
Americans wanted to build a Transcontinental Railroad to connect the west coast with the rest of the United States. Dividing the Nebraska territory into two, Kansas and Nebraska. The people of the territories decide whether or not slavery exists. Congress no longer decides whether slavery does or does not exist. Pro-slave and Anti-Slave groups settled in Kansas. Pro-slave claimed it to be a slave state and Anti-Slave claimed it to be a free state. -
Bleeding Kansas
Bleeding Kansas was a series of violent political confrontation because, Pro-slave "Border Ruffian" claimed it to be a slave state and Anti-Slave "Free Staters" claimed it to be a free state. -
Dred Scott v. Sandford
Dred Scott, a slave, sued for his freedom after the death of his master. He believed that he should be free since his master had taken him to a free territory Illinois and Wisconsin both free territory. The court held that it did not have jurisdiction because Scott was not a citizen of the US. He needed to be a citizen to have a valid. The decision added fuel to the sectional controversy and pushed the country closer to civil war. -
Election of 1860
Democrat Party: Split over the issue of Slavery. Stephen Douglas represents Northern Democrats and John C. Breckenridge represents Southern Democrats. Republican Party: was running Abraham Lincoln which his goal was to preserve the Union and to stop the expansion of slavery, not abolish slavery.
Democrat votes split between Douglas and Breckenridge and Lincoln was able to win the election without the Southern support.
