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The Mexican-American War (1846–1848) intensified sectional tensions because the vast new territories won from Mexico immediately raised the question of whether slavery would expand westward. McPherson notes that many Northerners believed the war was engineered to benefit slaveholders, deepening distrust and setting the stage for later conflicts over slavery in the territories (McPherson, 44).
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The Wilmot Proviso sought to ban slavery in any territory gained from Mexico, turning the war’s aftermath into a fierce political battle.
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The Compromise of 1850 was a set of bills meant to ease sectional tensions by balancing free and slave-state interests, but its terms satisfied neither side.
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The first session of the Nashville Convention (1850) brought together delegates from nine Southern states to debate how the South should respond to growing anti-slavery sentiment and the proposed Compromise of 1850.
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The second session of the Nashville Convention (late 1850) reconvened after the Compromise of 1850 passed, with far fewer delegates attending.
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The publication of Uncle Tom’s Cabin in 1852 galvanized anti-slavery sentiment across the North by portraying the moral horrors of slavery in vivid, emotional terms.
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The Gadsden Purchase added a small but strategically important strip of land from Mexico, intended in part to support a southern route for a transcontinental railroad.
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The Ostend Manifesto was a secret diplomatic proposal urging the United States to acquire Cuba, even by force if Spain refused to sell it.
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The Kansas-Nebraska Act repealed the Missouri Compromise and opened both territories to popular sovereignty, allowing settlers to decide whether to permit slavery.
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“Bleeding Kansas” saw violent conflict between pro-slavery and anti-slavery settlers after the Kansas-Nebraska Act opened the territory to popular sovereignty. Varon explains that the bloodshed became a national symbol of sectional crisis, convincing many Americans that democratic institutions were collapsing under the pressure of the slavery debate (Varon, 352–360).
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John Brown’s raid on Harpers Ferry in 1859 was an armed attempt to spark a widespread slave uprising by seizing a federal arsenal. Varon explains that although the raid failed, it convinced many Southerners that Northern abolitionists supported violent revolution, while many Northerners saw Brown as a martyr, pushing both sections closer to disunion (Varon, 410).