Transcription
What's popping, everyone?
Today, we're going to take a look at the period of 1854 to 1861. This is American Pageant Chapter 19, but also those other books—we've got you covered.
Key idea from last time: In the 1850s, the nation was becoming more and more polarized. Northern resistance to the Fugitive Slave Act was increasing day by day. In 1852, a book comes out called *Uncle Tom's Cabin* by Harriet Beecher Stowe. This book basically inspires many Northerners to resist the Fugitive Slave Act. The reason being is it brings the morality argument to the slavery debate. It exposed the horrors of slavery to a Northern audience and also to Europeans, especially in England and France. It was immensely popular.
As a result, during the Civil War, Lincoln even responds to Harriet Beecher Stowe, saying, "So you are the little woman who wrote the book that made this great war."
What you see is the results of the Kansas-Nebraska Act are horrific. It was assumed that Kansas would become a slave state and Nebraska would be a free state. Remember, it basically repealed the Missouri Compromise. What happens as a consequence is that pro-slavery and anti-slavery forces flood into Kansas. In fact, you get an abolitionist group called the New England Immigrant Aid Company sending like 2,000 free soilers into the area to try to ensure that popular sovereignty would go the way of no slavery.
You have these so-called Border Ruffians crossing the border—pro-slavery people from slave state Missouri are coming into Kansas. What you really have happening is that the Kansas-Nebraska Act was an immense failure. Two rival governments are set up. In fact, you get the Free Soil government in Topeka, Kansas, and you get the pro-slavery government in Lecompton.
A big result of the Kansas-Nebraska Act was the formation of the Republican Party. Basically, anybody who was opposed to the extension of slavery in the territories rallied around this opposition party, the Republicans. It's really Kansas-Nebraska that forms them.
Now, Kansas quickly spirals into a civil war known as Bleeding Kansas. Open fighting takes place. There's the Sack of Lawrence in 1856, where pro-slavery forces attacked the town of Lawrence, Kansas, killing a couple of people and destroying homes and local businesses.
Two days later, John Brown, along with his followers, attacks pro-slavery forces at Pottawatomie Creek. What they end up doing is literally hacking to death five alleged pro-slavery people. By 1856, you have civil war going on in Kansas between pro-slavery and anti-slavery forces. There is open fighting, and this fighting spreads to Congress.
Charles Sumner, an abolitionist senator from Massachusetts, gives a speech in Congress entitled "The Crimes Against Kansas." He basically condemns the events that are going on in Bleeding Kansas. What Charles Sumner does is he becomes enormously disliked outside of the North. During his speech, he also insults a Southern senator by the name of Andrew Butler. Southerners are outraged, not just for his anti-slavery speech, but also because he personally insulted Andrew Butler.
A couple of days later, Congressman Preston Brooks of South Carolina enters the chambers of Congress and beats Charles Sumner with a cane over his head until it breaks. Charles Sumner was so badly injured that he could not return to the Senate for many years.
What really is happening is the violence over slavery in Kansas has now spread to the halls of Congress. This inspired more people to join the Republican Party, but also Southerners rallied around Preston Brooks.
Now, in 1856, you have an election during this tense time. The Democratic Party is running against, for the first time, the Republican Party, which is running a candidate for the presidency, John C. Fremont. The Democratic candidate is James Buchanan. They pick him because he has nothing to do with the Kansas-Nebraska Act; he was over in London during its passage, so he's not tainted by this Kansas controversy.
There's also another party running, which is the Know Nothing Party, and they pick Millard Fillmore. They're really concerned about the Irish immigrants and Catholics, so they're anti-immigrant and anti-Catholic.
These three parties are running, and the Republicans do pretty well for a new party with mainly only support in the North, but ultimately, James Buchanan wins.
James Buchanan faces one crisis after another after winning the presidency in 1856. In fact, what happens in Kansas is the Lecompton Constitution. The Lecompton Constitution was drafted by pro-slavery supporters in Kansas, setting up the territory with a pro-slavery Constitution. The reason why it's passed is free soilers boycott the election. They feel like the people crossing the border from Missouri are corrupting the political process of popular sovereignty, and they boycott the election.
The Lecompton Constitution is approved and supported by President Buchanan but ultimately rejected by Congress. So you have this battle over what Kansas was going to look like, and ultimately, popular sovereignty was proving to be a failure.
Not too long after this crisis is the biggest one, and that is the Dred Scott case. Dred Scott was a slave who sued for his freedom. He was a slave in Missouri, and his master took him to free territory in Wisconsin for like two years. He sues based upon that, saying, "Hey, I was in free soil, so therefore I'm free."
The case goes to the Supreme Court in 1857, and the Chief Justice, a Southern Democrat, Roger Taney, is the head of the court. The court is dominated by Southerners, and it rules a couple of things in Dred Scott:
1. African Americans are not citizens of the United States, so therefore they could not sue in court.
2. Since slaves are property, they cannot be taken away under the Constitution and the Fifth Amendment.
Since slaves are property, that means Congress could not make laws regarding slavery in the territories. Owning slaves is protected everywhere because the Constitution says it. Therefore, the Dred Scott case not only rules that African Americans are not citizens, but it also rules that slavery cannot be banned by Congress anywhere at any time.
In fact, the Missouri Compromise, which was already overturned because of the Kansas-Nebraska Act, is unconstitutional. For Northerners, and especially the Republican Party, this is seen as an outrage. The court has now opened slavery in all the territories potentially, and they condemn the Dred Scott case as a result.
In 1858, you have a really famous debate take place between Abraham Lincoln and Stephen Douglas, the guy from the Kansas-Nebraska Act, who is a Northern Democrat. They hold seven debates for the Illinois Senate seat between these two men, and these debates become the focus of national attention.
Lincoln, during the debates, challenges Douglas on the Dred Scott decision. He asks Douglas if slavery could be prevented in the territories because, according to Dred Scott, the answer is no. Southerners love that. So how is Stephen Douglas going to respond?
A Northerner, but nonetheless a Democrat, he says in his Freeport Doctrine that territories could limit slavery, and Southerners are pissed. Douglas stands on principle and says popular sovereignty can still happen, rejecting the findings and the decision of the Dred Scott case. That angers Southerners.
The results of the Lincoln-Douglas campaign and the debates are that Douglas keeps his Senate seat; he wins the election. Lincoln becomes a national figure, giving his famous "House Divided" speech during these debates. Finally, Southerners are going to be bitterly divided among one another because they're really angry that Douglas took the position he did in the Freeport Doctrine.
Another event that you need to know about is John Brown at Harper's Ferry. The violence just escalates. John Brown, the guy from Pottawatomie Creek fame, hopes to spark a slave revolt in Virginia in 1859. He goes with this plan to seize the federal arsenal at Harper's Ferry in Virginia, intending to spark a slave revolt by acquiring the guns at Harper's Ferry.
Things don't go well. He's charged with treason, and he, along with some of his followers, is eventually hung. There's John Brown kissing the baby on his way to the gallows.
The impact of John Brown at Harper's Ferry, though, is immense. The South is outraged; they feel like John Brown was supported by Northerners and that he was somehow sent by the North to undermine slavery. Brown becomes a martyr to many abolitionists, although most Northerners don't support his actions. He does become a martyr because he's willing to die for the anti-slavery cause, and it's really one of the immediate causes of secession.
Southerners feel like they're under attack, and John Brown provides them proof of that attack. That leads us to the election of 1860.
As I said, the Democrats are split among one another. The issue of slavery, specifically popular sovereignty and the Dred Scott case, splits them. The Northern Democrats favor Stephen Douglas, who supports popular sovereignty and the enforcement of the Fugitive Slave Act. But the Southern Democrats don't want him to be the candidate.
You have a split at the convention where the Southern Democrats favor John C. Breckinridge. Breckinridge's position is very clear: allow slavery in the territories and annex Cuba to make it a slave state.
So the Democrats are a mess. In fact, the Republican Party picks that handsome fella, Lincoln, as the guy who's nominated. The Republican platform has a little bit for everybody in the North:
1. For the free soilers, no extension of slavery in the territories—so they're not going to have slavery expanded; it can be where it is, but they're not against slavery.
2. For the Northern manufacturers, a protective tariff.
3. For the Northwest, a railroad that would go across the country.
4. For the farmers, free land homesteads.
Their platform is really simple.
There's also another party that runs in the election called the Constitutional Union Party, with John Bell. They basically try to avoid the issue of slavery; their whole position is to enforce the Constitution and the laws of the nation.
Southerners, the secessionists, say if Lincoln wins, they're going to leave the Union.
So let's see what happens in 1860. The results: Lincoln, the Republican Party, wins the presidency for the first time. The problem, though, is he is a minority president; he gets less than 40% of the popular vote. He does get enough of the electoral vote, but he is not a president with a large margin of support.
In fact, Southerners see him as a sectional president. He's not even on the ballot in 10 Southern states. When Lincoln wins the presidency, South Carolina is the first to vote for secession in December of 1860. By the time Lincoln takes office, seven Southern states, shown in blue on that map, are going to be gone from the Union. They are going to leave the Union because they see him as a sectional president hostile to the institution of slavery.
They create the Confederate States of America and nominate President Jefferson Davis. The president at the time, James Buchanan, is still in office from November 1860 to March of 1861. He's a lame duck, basically waiting for the incoming president to take office. He does nothing to stop secession; he does not believe that secession is legal, but he doesn't really feel like he has any options to do anything about these Southern states leaving.
There is one last attempt at compromise—can we get one more? That is the Crittenden Compromise. It is an attempt to avoid a major crisis and hopes to calm Southern fears. It basically has a really simple idea: let's return to the idea of the Missouri Compromise. Slavery would be prohibited in territories north of 36°30' and allowed in territories south.
But ultimately, Lincoln and the Republican Party reject this because their position in 1860 was no extension of slavery in the territories. Of course, seven Southern states will have left the Union before Lincoln even enters the White House.
That's all for this chapter. Hopefully, you learned some stuff. If you haven't done so, subscribe, like the video, post some questions, tell like 20 friends about the channel, and peace!