Name:____________________________________Period:________
Date:_______________________
10 Events Leading the to Civil War Notes
1.) The Missouri Compromise
a. Date: March 3, 1820
b. Missouri Compromise: The first confrontation over slavery in the West.
c. Missouri applied for admission to the Union as a Slave state. The admission of
Missouri would upset the balance of power in the Senate where at the time there
were 11 free states and 11 slave states.
d. Senator Henry Clay proposed a compromise. In 1820, he suggested that Missouri
enter as a slave state and Maine as a free state to keep the balance of power.
i. Henry Clay was known as “ The Great Compromiser ”
e. Congress also drew an imaginary line across the Louisiana Purchase 36 degree 30
minute north latitude.
i. North of the line would be free states (with the exception of Missouri), and
south of the line would be slave states.
f. What this does: Officially separates the country between slave states and free
states .Now we have two opposing sides with opposing viewpoints and lifestyles.
2.) Nat Turner’s Rebellion
a. Date: August 1831
b. Took place in Southampton County, Virginia
c. Turner was a slave on Joseph Travis’ plantation, he was educated and deeply
religious
i. He believed that he was chosen by God to lead the slaves from their
bondage.
ii. It is said that he had visions which he used to time his rebellion.
d. On August 21 Turner and several other slaves began their rebellion by killing
Travis and his whole family.
e. The group moved through the town from house to house killing the white families
they found and freeing the slaves.
i. By the end they had amassed a force of around 70 slaves and massacred over
50 men, women, and children.
f. They were stopped after two days by a militia with more than double the
manpower and artillery support.
g. Nat Turn hid out for 6 weeks before being discovered and executed along with 16
of his followers.
Name:____________________________________Period:________
Date:_______________________
10 Events Leading the to Civil War Notes
i. Additionally 56 of the rebelling slaves were executed and between 100-200
additional blacks were killed by mobs as a result of the rebellion.
ii. This is the bloodiest slave revolt in American history.
h. What this does: This was the Southerner’s worst fears come to life. After the
rebellion life in the South got worse for slaves as fear spread in the South.
i. Emancipation movement was ended in that region
ii. Harsher rules and laws governing slaves
iii. Worsening relations between slave holders and free labor activists
3.) The Compromise of 1850
a. Date: January 29, 1850
b. Proposed by Henry Clay and Daniel Webster
c. California applied for admission as a free state. Once again, the balance of power
in the Senate was threatened.
d. The South did not want to give the North a majority in the Senate. They also feared
that more free states would be carved from the Mexican Cession
e. Once again, Clay pleaded for compromise. John C. Calhoun, a senator of South
Carolina stated the South would not compromise.
i. He demanded that slavery be allowed in the western territories and that
there be a tough fugitive-slave law.
ii. The annexation of Texas and the size of the state had both anti-slavery and
pro-slavery camps nervous.
f. Daniel Webster of Massachusetts offered a solution to keep the Union together.
The Compromise of 1850 had four parts:
i. California entered as a free state.
ii. The rest of the Mexican cession was divided into New Mexico and Utah. In
each state, voters would decide the issue of slavery.
iii. The slave trade was ended in Washington D.C.
iv. A strict new fugitive-slave act was passed.
g. What this does: This did nothing to fix the growing problems in the country. If
anything all it did was reinforce the lines dividing the slave and abolitionist
populations.
4.) Fugitive Slave Act
a. Date: September 18, 1850
b. This was part of the requirements in the Compromise of 1850. It was an extremely
controversial law.
Name:____________________________________Period:________
Date:_______________________
10 Events Leading the to Civil War Notes
c. The Fugitive Slave Act's chief purpose was to track fugitive slaves who had
runaway to northern states, capture them, and then return them to their proper
southern owners.
i. Also any slave that had been captured by an official and claimed to be free
(a common incident), was denied the right of a fair trial by jury.
d. It made it so that all citizens were obligated to return runaway slaves. People who
helped slaves escape would be fined and jailed.
i. People who wanted to help slaves escape started to turn to the Underground
Railroad to get them to Canada or Mexico.
1. Simply getting them to the North no longer guaranteed their safety.
e. What this does: The law enraged Northerners because it made them feel a part of
the slave system. Now Northerners had to see bounty hunters and other evidence of
slavery in the North.
5.) Uncle Tom’s Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe
a. Date: March 20, 1852
b. This novel told of the story of Uncle Toms, an enslaved African American, and his
cruel master, Simon Legree.
i. Stowe used the book to show the cruelty and injustice of slavery to an
enormous audience around the country.
c. While the book is a work of fiction, the novel still had an enormous influence.
i. The book sold more than 300,000 copies, was published in many languages,
and was made into a play.
ii. Uncle Tom’s Cabin was the second-best-selling book in America in the 19th
century, second only to the Bible.
d. What it does: It helped change the way many Northerners felt about slavery.
Slavery was now not only a political problem but a moral issue too. While
Southerners felt that the work was a complete falsehood and an unfair portrait of
slavery designed to make them look bad.
6.) Founding of the Republican Party
a. Date: March 20, 1854
b. Founded in Ripon, Wisconsin and made up of anti-slavery Whigs, Northern
Democrats, and the Free Soliers.
c. The party quickly gained popularity in the North and soon dominated the region.
d. They were largely opposed to the spread of slavery while some of the more radical
members wanted an end to the institution entirely.
Name:____________________________________Period:________
Date:_______________________
10 Events Leading the to Civil War Notes
i. An early slogan of the party was “Free Labor, Free Land, Free People”
e. What this does: Now along with two separate regions, there were two different
political parties which stood in opposition to each other.
i. The North was largely Republican.
ii. The South was largely Democratic and would threaten secession should a
Republican become president.
7.) Kansas Nebraska Act
a. Date: May 30, 1854
b. Stephen Douglas introduced a bill to help solve the problem of slavery in the new
Nebraska territory. He proposed that Nebraska be divided into two territories —
Kansas and Nebraska
i. The settlers of the new territories would decide whether they would be slave
or free. This proposal set off a storm of controversy because it effectively
undid the Missouri Compromise
1. Meaning: Slavery in the territories would be decided based on a
popular vote.
ii. Southerners supported the act, while Northerners felt it was a betrayal.
c. The Act set off major violence in the Kansas territory which became known as
Bleeding Kansas.
i. Both anti and pro-slavery supporters flocked into the territory to try and
sway the vote, these people are called Border Ruffians.
ii. Anti and pro-slavery forces set up rival governments and over 5 years
violence in the territories will claim between 50 and 200 lives.
d. In the end both territories will set up anti-slavery constitutions.
e. What this does: The fighting between the two sides now erupts into physical
violence on a larger scale that had ever been seen before. People are now fighting
and dying over the issue of slavery and regional differences.
8.) Dred Scott v. Sanford Decision
a. Date: March 6, 1857
b. Dred Scott was a slave who applied and sued for his freedom. He claimed that
because his master had taken him to the free territories of Wisconsin and Illinois,
he should be free.
c. The court ruled that because Dred Scott was not considered a citizen, but property,
he could not file a lawsuit.
Name:____________________________________Period:________
Date:_______________________
10 Events Leading the to Civil War Notes
d. The Court also ruled that Congress had no power to decide the issue of slavery in
the territories.
i. This meant that slavery was legal in all the territories and the Missouri
Compromise was unconstitutional.
e. What this does: This decision polarized the country. The Southerners saw it as a
justification of slavery while Northerners and the Republican party saw it as major
setback in their anti-slavery agenda.
9.) John Brown’s Raid on Harper’s Ferry
a. Date: October 16, 1859
b. John Brown was a militant radical who opposed slavery and believed that it could
only be ended through the use of violence.
i. Brown had already participated in the violent riots during Bleeding Kansas
where he and his followers would attack and kill pro-slavery families.
c. In 1859 he and 21 of his followers organized a raid on Harpers Ferry, Virginia,
which was a federal arsenal (weapons storage facility).
i. Brown hoped that slaves would come to the arsenal and he would then lead a
massive slave uprising.
ii. Problems: Brown forgot to factor in the train which rain through the town
and how to make sure that the local slave population was aware of the
uprising with enough time to participate.
d. Brown was unsuccessful, and troops led by Robert E. Lee killed 10 raiders and
captured John Brown.
e. He was found guilty of murder and treason and sentenced to death. Brown
conducted himself with great composure during his trial.
i. “I, John Brown, am now quite certain, that the crimes of this guilty land will
never be purged away, but with blood.”
-a note that Brown passed to his jailor on the way to the gallows
f. What this does:
i. In the North, people begin to view Brown as a hero and even more so a
martyr who died for a valiant cause.
ii. Southerners see him as an insane upstart who is out to end the Southern way
of life.
Name:____________________________________Period:________
Date:_______________________
10 Events Leading the to Civil War Notes
10.)
a.
b.
c.
d.
e.
f.
Abraham Lincoln is elected President
Date: November 6, 1860
By 1860 the Republican Party was ready to challenge the Democratic power by
running their own candidate. Their main goal as a party was to keep slavery out of
the western territories, not end slavery in the South.
The Republicans ran Abraham Lincoln from Illinois. Lincoln was known to oppose
slavery on the basis of its being morally wrong. However, Lincoln was not willing
to end slavery at the risk of tearing the Union apart.
When Lincoln was running for President his name did not appear on a majority of
the Southern ballots and some Southern states, such as South Carolina threatened
to secede if Lincoln won the election.
i. Despite not appearing on many ballots Lincoln wins the election and
becomes the nation’s 16th president.
December 20, 1860: a little over a month after the election South Carolina
becomes the first state to secede from the Union and by the spring of 1861 six
other Southern states would follow.
What this does: The country is now officially split into two and the stage is set for
the beginning of the Civil War.