• Both of the political parties had a desire for national unity

• Each wanted powerful support in the north and south

• If the unity wavered into sectionalism, the Union would be in peril

• The solution was for politicians to push the issue of slavery under the carpet and ignore the growing turmoil

• As much as they tried, the issue did start to come up in response to the debate of abolitionists against southern nationalists

• The Democrats needed a new president in 1848

• Polk had health problems and pledged himself to a single term only

• The Democratic National Convention in Baltimore turned to and older leader, General Lewis Cass

• Cass was a veteran of the War of 1812

• Sour-visaged and pompous

• Enemies dubbed him “General Gass” and noted that Cass rhymed with Jackass

• Democratic platform was silent on the issue of slavery

• Cass himself was not silent on slavery

• He was the father of popular sovereignty, the doctrine that said that the sovereign people in a territory, under the Constitution, should themselves determine the status of slavery

• Popular sovereignty had a large appeal

• The public liked it because it accorded with the democratic tradition of self-determination

• Politicians liked it because it seemed a comfortable compromise between the abolitionists’ bid for a slavery ban in the territories and southern demands that Congress should protect slavery in the territories.

• Popular sovereignty tossed the problem of slavery into the people in the territories to decide for themselves

• Supporters hoped that the principle would dissolve the pressing national issue into smaller local issues

• Popular sovereignty had one fatal defect: it might serve to spread slavery more

General Taylor

• The Whig party in Philadelphia cashed in on “Taylor fever” when they nominated the “Hero of Buena Vista” Zachary Taylor

• He had never held civil office or even voted in a presidential election

• Logically, Henry Clay would have been nominated, but he had too many enemies for it to work out

• Eager to win the election at any cost, they dodged all troublesome issues and only praised the homespun virtues of their candidate

• Taylor was not committed on the issue of slavery extension

• As a wealthy resident in Louisiana living on a sugar plantation, Taylor owned scores of slaves

• Antislavery men in the North who distrusted both Cass and Taylor organized the Free Soil party

• Aroused by the conspiracy of silence in the Whig and Democratic party, the Free-Soilers were very sure on their opinion

• They squarely supported the Wilmot Proviso and was against slavery in the territories

• Going further than other antislavery groups, they broadened their appeal by advocating for federal aid for internal improvements and by urging free government homesteads for settlers

• The new party assembled an assortment of new fellows in the same political bed

• The party attracted industrialists annoyed at Polk’s reduction of protective tariffs

• Appealed to democrats resentful of Polk’s settling for part of the Oregon territory while insisting on the entirety of Texas

• Disparity that suggested a menacing southern dominance in the Democratic party

• Harbored northerners that whose hatred was directed not much as slavery as at blacks and who didn’t like the ideas of sharing the newly aquired western terriotries with African Americans

• Also contained a large element of “Conscience Whigs,” heavily influenced by the abolitionist crusade who condemned slavery on moral grounds

• The party also brought forward older former president Martin Van Buren

• They advocated for free soil, free speech, free labor, and free men

• Condemed slavery not for enslaving blacks but for destroying the chances of free white workers to be able to rise up from wage-earning dependence to the status of self-employment

• They argued that only with free soil in the West could a traditional American commitment to upward mobility continue to flourish

• If forced to compete with slave labor, more costly wage labor would wither away and be unessessary, and with it the chance for American people to own property

• The Free Soil party foreshadowed the emergence of the Republican party six years later

• With the issue of slavery pushed away by the two primary political parties, the politicians on both sides opened fire on personalities

• Taylor won the close election in the popular and electoral votes

California Gold

• The discovery of gold in California in 1848 blew the lid on slavery that president Taylor was sitting on

• A horde of people flocked to the territory in search for gold

• The most reliable profits were made by the people who “mined the miner” -  charging very high rates for laundry and other services

• Some of the forty-niners continued through California to more distant places like Australia for gold

• The gold rush attracted tens of thousands of people to the soon to be Golden State

• Americans, Mexicans, Chileans, Chinese, and Natives all were sucked into mining camps with gambling, prostiution, and other debauchery

• California’s government tried to restrict non-white participation in gold mining

• Robbery, claim jumping, and murder were common

• President Taylor privately encouraged California to draft a constitution, which they did in 1849

• Excluded slavery and then boldly applied to Congress for admission

• Southern politicians violently opposed in congress

Sectional Balance and the Underground Railroad

• Despite the debates, southern slavery in 1850 appreared politically and economically sound

• The south had much of the nations leadership still in politics

• President Taylor was a Virginian born slave owner from Louisiana

• They had a majority in the cabinet and the supreme court

• If outnumbered in the house, they did had an even split in the senate which could neutralize northern pushes

• Cotton fields were expanding and prices were profitably high

• Few people believed there was a threat to slavery

• The South however was deeply worried by the ever-tipping political balance

• Before california there were 15 free and 15 slave states

• Admission of a new state would destroy the equilibrium in the senate

• Texas also claimed about half the territory of present day New Mexico

• The federal government was proposing to detach the claim, but Texans were threatening to descend on Santa Fe and take what they thought was theirs

• Many southerners were angered by nagging agitation from the North for abolition in DC

• DC is in between slave state Virginia and slave state Maryland

• Even more angering to the south was the loss of runaway slaves to the north through the undergroud railroad

• Harriet Tubman - runaway slave from Maryland, rescued more than 300 slaves

• By 1850 southerners wanted a strict fugitive slave law

• The south in 1850 was losing around 1,000 slaves out of 4 million slaves a year

• Most blacks earned their freedom through self-purchase or voluntary emancipation instead of running

Senatorial Giants

• California was getting close to admission in 1850

• “Fire-eaters” in the South were starting to voice threats of secession

• In October 1849 southerners had announced their intention to convene the following year in Nashville to consider secession

• Henry Clay proposed a series of compromises to Congress along with Senator Stephen A. Douglas of Illinois

• Clay wanted the north to enact a fugitive slave law that allows the south to get escaped slaves

• John C Calhoun, dying of tuberculosis, gave his last speech to the senate calling to leave slavery alone along with returning runaway slaves, give the south its rights as a minority, and restore political balance

• He also wanted the election of two presidents - one from the north and one from the south - eah wielding a veto

• Calhoun died in 1850

• Daniel Webster upheld Clay’s compromise idea in the Senate, urging all reasonable concession to the south, including a new fugitive slave law

• He asked why slavery in the territories needed legislation, saying to do so was sacrilegious, because God already passed the Wilmot Proviso and decided slavery couldn’t profitably exsit in the Mexican Cession territory

• He concluded that compromise would provide the only solutions

• The speech from Webster helped turn the tide in the North toward compromise

• It was pleasing to northern banks who would have lost a lot of money in secession

• Webster regarded slavery as evil but disunion as worse

Danger on Capitol Hill

• The Young Guard in the north was yet to have their say in congress

• Unlike the old guard, they had not grown up with the union, and they were more interested in purging and purifying it than patching and preserving it

• William H. Seward, freshman senator from New York, was the spokesman for the younger northern radicals

• Came out against concession as a strong anti-slave person

• Envisioned a future US without slavery, and was impervious to Southern indignation

• Argued that Christian legislators must obey God’s moral law and well as man’s mundane law

• Reference to excluding slavery in the territories to a higher law than the constitution

• This phrase cost him the election of 1860

• Taylor was bent on vetoing any law passed through congress

• Threatened by the threats of Texas

• Determined to lead an army against Texas if needed

• If troops had begun to march, the south probably would have defended Texas and the civil war could have started right there in 1850

Compromise of 1850

• Taylor died suddenly in 1850 and vice president Millard Filmore, New York lawyer, took the reins of the country

• He was impressed with the arguments for conciliation and signed the series of compromise measures that passed Congress after months of stormy debate

• The compromise of 1850

• California admitted as a free state, territory disputed by Texas so be surrendered to New Mexico, and the abolition of the slave trade (not slavery) in DC

• The remainder of the mexican cession territory to be formed as New Mexico and Utah without restrictions on slavery, Texas would recieve $10 million as compensation, and a more stingent fugitive slave law went beyond that of 1793

Fugitive Slave Law

• California tipped the balance in the Senate permanently against the south

• The Fugitive Slave Law of 1850 stirred up a storm of opposition in the North

• Fleeing slaves couldn’t testify in their own behalf and were denied a jury trial

• Threatened to create dangerous precedents for white Americans

• The federal commissioner who handled the case would get 5 dollars in the runaway were freed and 10 if not - closely resembling a bribe

• Any northerner could be deputized and ordered to join the slave-catchers

• Many shocked moderates, were driven into the swelling ranks of abolitionists

• The Underground Railroad also stepped up its timetable

• Abolitionists organized committees to assist fugitive slaves, and angry northern mobs rescued slaves from their pursuers

• Massachusetts made it an offense to enforce the new federal statute

• South was angry because the north did not execute the law in good faith

• The north was advancing faster than the south

• In population, wealth, crops, factories, ships, and railroads, and more people becoming more and more abolitionist

• By the time the issue exploded in 1860, the north was in a stronger position to prosecute a war

Defeat for the Whigs

• Meeting in Baltimore, the Democratic nominating convention of 1852 startled the nation

• Deadlocked, it eventually nominated Franklin Pierce from New Hampshire

• Pierce was a weak and indecisive person

• Served without real distinction in the Mexican War

• Enemyless because he had been inconspicuous

• Pro Southerner from the north

• His platform revived the Democratic commitment to territorial expansion that was pursued by President Polk and endorsed the 1850 compromise

• The Whigs, also in Baltimore, nominated Winfield Scott

• The ablest American general of his generation

• Less enthusiastic about the 1850 compromise

• The Whig party was split

• Antislavery Whigs in the north swallowed Scott as the nominee but deplored his platform, which endorsed the Fugitive Slave Law

• Pierce won the election

• 254 electoral votes to 42, with a closer popular vote

• The election of 1852 carried significance

• Marked the end of the Whig party

Expansion South of the Border

• The victory in the Mexican War, mixed with the discovery of gold in California, provided a desire for more expansion

• America began eyeing central america, which split the ocean, making a atlantic to pacific transportation route impossible unless going around the entirety of south america

• A treaty in 1846 between Colombia(New Granada) and the US guaranteed American right of transit across the isthmus in return for washington’s pledge to maintain the “perfect neutrality” of the route so that the free transit of traffic might not be interrupted

• Later provided legal cover for Theodore Roosevelt’s assertion of American control of the Panama Canal Zone in 1903

• Also led to production of the first transcontinental railroad in 1855

• Running 48 miles from coast to coast in the green hell of the Panamanian jungle

• Confrontation with the British was avoided with the Clayton-Bulwer Treaty in 1850

• Said that neither America nor Britain would fortify or seek control over any future isthmian waterway

• The south desired new slave territory

• A man named William Walker installed himself, backed by an armed force, president of Nicaragua and legalized slavery there in 1856

• A coalition of Central American forces formed an alliance to overthrow him

• President Pierce withdrew diplomatic recognition and Walker died to a Honduran firing squad in 1860

• Cuba was also a target for expansion

• Sugar-rich land

• Spain was not interested in selling or giving up the land to America

• After Cuba seized an American ship on a technicality

• America made a dispatch named the Ostend Manifesto that urged Spain to sell Cuba for 120 million. If they refused, the US would be “justified”  to fight Spain for the island

• The secret manifesto got leaked

• Pressure forced Pierce to drop its scheme for Cuba

• Slavery checked territorial expansion in the 1850s

The Allure of Asia

• The acquisition of California and Oregon made the United States a Pacific power

• America now wanted to tap into the Asian markets more deeply than they were

• Rivalry with Britain once again played a role

• Britain humbled China in the Opium War, which ensure British traders the right to peddle opium in the Celestial Kingdom

• Britain as a result gained access to five treaty ports, as well as control of Hong Kong

• President Taylor dispatched Caleb Cushing from Massachusetts to secure comparable concession for the United States

• His 4 warships arrived in southern China in early 1844 bearing gifts

• Chinese diplomats signed the Treaty of Wanghia which was the first formal diplomatic agreement between the United States and China in July 1844

• Cushing was interested in commerce, not colonies, and he secured rights and privileges from the Chinese

• Any and all trading terms was given to the US

• American trade flourished with China thanks to the treaty

• Success in China left a desire to expand influence into the bamboo gates of Japan

• Japan was in an almost completely isolated state

• Prohibited shipwrecked sailors from leaving and refused to readmit Japanese sailors who washed up on foreign shores

• By 1853 Japan was ready to emerge from its self-imposed quarantine

• In 1852 president Fillmore dispatched a fleet of warships to Japan commanded by Matthew C. Perry

• His ships stormed into Edo(later Tokyo) and after tense negotiation in which Perry threatened to blast his way ashore if necessary, Perry gave letters requesting free trade and relations with Japan and said he would return next year to get a reply

• He returned the next year with an even larger force

• Playing the japanese with gifts including a miniature steam train and 350 feet of track, he persuaded the Japanese to sign the Treaty of Kanagawa which providing american coaling rights in japan, cracking their isolation wide open

Pacific Railroad Promoters and the Gadsden Purchase

• After California and Oregon were acquired, the transcontinental railroad was proposed.  The open question was: Where to put the railroad's terminus? In the North or the South?

• Secretary of War Jefferson Davis had James Gadsden buy an area of Mexico from Santa Anna through which the railroad would pass. Gadsden negotiated a treaty in 1853 and the Gadsden Purchase area was ceded to the United States for $10 million.

• Southerners argued that the railroad should run through Texas and the New Mexico territory because Texas was already a state and the New Mexico territory was a formally organized territory (it had federal troops to provide protection from Indians). The proposed Northern railroad route ran through the Nebraska territory, which was not protected by troops. The Northerners proposed plans for organizing this territory.

Kansas-Nebraska

• Stephen A. Douglas: senator who tried to break the North-South deadlock over westward expansion; proposed the Territory of Nebraska to be sliced into two territories, Kansas and Nebraska.  Their status on slavery would be decided by popular sovereignty.  Kansas would be presumed to be a slave state, while Nebraska would be a free state.

• This Kansas-Nebraska Act conflicted with the Missouri Compromise of 1820, which forbade slavery in the proposed Nebraska Territory. Douglas was forced to propose the repealing of the Missouri Compromise. President Pierce fully supported the Kansas-Nebraska Bill.

Congress Legislates a Civil War

• The Kansas-Nebraska Act wrecked two compromises: the Compromise of 1820 was repealed by the act; the Compromise of 1850 was henceforth rejected by Northerners.

• The blunder of the Kansas-Nebraska Act hurt the Democratic Party.

• The Republican Party was formed in the Mid-West and it was morally against slavery.  The party included Whigs, Democrats, Free-Soilers, Know-Nothings, and other foes of the Kansas-Nebraska Act.  The Southerners hated the Republican Part

Stowe and Helper: Literary Incendiaries

• White woman Harriet Beecher Stowe published Uncle Tom’s Cabin

• Also published abroad

• The novels success was sensational

• Was also made into a show

• It made slavery appear almost as evil as it truly was

• After reading, governments in London and Paris started to consider helping against the south

• Hinton R. Helper, a non-aristocrat from North Carolina, wrote The Impending Crisis of the South in 1857.  He hated both blacks and slavery, and he attempted to use statistics to prove that the non-slaveholding whites were the ones who suffered the most from slavery

The North South Contest for Kansas

• Most of the people who came to Kansas were just westward-moving pioneers.  The New England Emigrant Aid Company, a group of abolitionists, paid some people to move to Kansas to make it a free state. (The Kansas and Nebraska territories had popular sovereignty in choosing slavery, according to the Kansas-Nebraska Act. Nebraska was so far north that its future as a free state was never in question.)

• In 1855 when Kansas was having its legislature elections, many pro-slavery people came from Missouri to vote. They sought to elect pro-slavery officials.  The slavery supporters won the elections and set up their own government at Shawnee Mission.  The abolitionists then set up their own government in Topeka, giving the Kansas territory two governments.

• In 1856, the civil war in Kansas started when a group of pro-slavery riders burned down part of the abolitionist's town of Lawrence

Kansas in Convulsion

• John Brown: fanatical abolitionist who, in May of 1856**,** hacked to death 5 presumed pro-slavery men at Pottawatomie Creek in response to the pro-slavery events in Lawrence.

• Civil war flared up in Kansas in 1856, and continued until it merged with the nation's Civil War of 1861-1865.

• In 1857, Kansas had enough people to apply for statehood.  Its citizens were going to vote again on whether or not to have slavery in the state   of Kansas.  To keep the abolitionists from creating a free state, the pro-slavery politicians created the Lecompton Constitution.  The document stated that the people were not allowed to vote for or against the constitution as a whole, rather, they could vote on whether the constitution would be "with slavery" or "without slavery."  If slavery was voted against, then one of the provisions in the constitution would protect those who already owned slaves in Kansas.  Many abolitionists boycotted voting, so the constitution was approved to include slavery.

• James Buchanan, a Democrat, succeeded Pierce as the President of the United States in the election of 1856.  He had a strong southern influence and approved of the Lecompton Constitution.  Senator Stephen Douglas was strongly opposed to the document and he campaigned against it.  Eventually, a compromise was reached that enabled the people of Kansas to vote on the Lecompton Constitution, itself.  It was revoked by the abolitionists voters, but Kansas ended up remaining a territory until 1861, when the southern states seceded from the Union

• President Buchanan divided the powerful Democratic Party by enraging some Democrats of the North.  He divided the only remaining national party and with it, the Union.

Brooks and Sumner

• In 1856, abolitionist Senator Charles Sumner of Massachusetts gave a provoking speech condemning pro-slavery men. During this speech, Sumner also personally insulted Senator Andrew Butler of South Carolina. Two days later on May 22, 1856, Butler's nephew, Preston Brooks, beat Sumner with a cane to unconsciousness.

• The speech made by Sumner was applauded in the North, angering the South.

• The clash between Sumner and Butler showed how violent and impassioned the Northerners and Southerners were for their cause.

• Congressmen began carrying weapons on to the congressional floor

“Old Buck” Versus “The Pathfinder”

• Meeting in Cincinnati, the Democrats chose James Buchanan as their presidential candidate to run in the election of 1856 because he wasn't involved with the divisive Kansas-Nebraska Act.  The Democratic platform campaigned for popular sovereignty.

• Meeting in Philadelphia, the Republicans chose Captain John C. Fremont because he was also not influenced by the Kansas-Nebraska Act.  The Republican platform campaigned against the extension of slavery.

• The American Party, also called the Know-Nothing Party, was formed by Protestants who were alarmed by the increasing number of immigrants coming from Ireland and Germany.  They chose former president Millard Fillmore as their candidate for the election of 1856.

The Election of 1856

• James Buchanan won the election of 1856.

• It was a good thing that the Republican Party did not win the election because some southerners said that if a Republican had won, then they would secede.

• This election was a small victory for the Republican Party because the party was just 2 years old, yet it put up a fight for the Democrats.

Dred Scott

• Dred Scott, a slave who had lived with his master for 5 years in Illinois and the Wisconsin Territory, sued for his freedom on the basis of his long residence on free soil.  In Dred Scott vs. Stanford, the Supreme Court first ruled that because Scott was a black slave and not a citizen, he\could not sue in Federal courts. The Court also ruled that because a slave was private pro

• perty, he could be taken into any territory and legally held there in slavery.  The Fifth Amendment forbade Congress from depriving people of their property without the due process of law.  The Court went further and stated that the Missouri Compromise of 1820 wasunconstitutional and that Congress had no power to ban slavery from the territories, no matter what the territorial legislatures themselves wanted.

• This victory delighted Southerners, while it infuriated Northerners and supporters of popular sovereignty.

The Financial Crash of 1857

• The panic of 1857 was caused by over-speculation in the West and currency inflation due to the inrush of Californian gold.  The North was the hardest hit, while the South continued to flourish with its cotton.

• Northerners came up with the idea of the government giving 160-acre plots of farming land to pioneers for free.  Two groups opposed the idea:  Eastern industrialists feared that the free land would drain its supply of workers, and the South feared that the West would fill up with free-soilers who would form anti-slavery states, unbalancing the Senate even more.  Congress passed a homestead act in 1860, making public lands available at $0.25/acre, but it was vetoed by President Buchanan.

• The Tariff of 1857 lowered import taxes to about 20%.  The North blamed it for causing the panic, because they felt they needed higher duties for more protection.  This gave the Republicans two economic issues for the election of 1860:  protection for the unprotected and farms for the farmless.

An Illinois Rail-Splitter Emerges

• Illinois chose Abraham Lincoln in their senatorial election of 1858 to run against Democrat Stephan Douglas

• Lincoln serves in the Illinois legislature as a Whig politician and then did one term in congress

The Great Debate: Lincoln Versus Douglas

• Lincoln challenged Douglas to a series of seven debates that were arranged from August to October 1858 (Lincoln-Douglas debates).

• The most famous debate happened in Freeport, Illinois.  Lincoln asked Douglas, "What if the people of a territory should vote down slavery?"  The Supreme Court in the Dred Scott decision had said that the people could not do this.  Douglas's reply to him became known as the "Freeport Doctrine."  Douglas argued that no matter how the Supreme Court ruled, slavery would stay down if the people voted it down.  Laws to protect slavery would have to be voted on by the territorial legislatures.

• Douglas won the senatorial election, but Lincoln won the popular vote.

John Brown

• Abolitionist John Brown developed a plan to secretly invade the South, call upon the slaves to rise, give the slaves weapons, and establish a black free state.

• In October 1859, he seized the federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry.  Because many of his supporters failed to show up, he was caught and sentenced to death by hanging.  When Brown died, he lived on as a martyr to the abolitionist cause.b

• The Disruption of the Democrats

• For the election of 1860, the Democrats met in Charleston, South Carolina to choose their candidate.  The northern part of the party wanted to nominate Stephen Douglas, but the southern "fire-eaters" saw him as a traitor for his unpopular opposition to the Lecompton Constitution and his unpopular Freeport Doctrine reply.  After the delegates from most of the cotton states walked out, the Democrats met again in Baltimore to elect a candidate.  This time, Douglas was elected, despite the fact that the southerners again walked out.

• The southern Democrats met in Baltimore to choose their own Democratic presidential candidate.  They chose vice-president John C. Breckenridge.  The platform favored the extension of slavery into the territories and the annexation of slave-populated Cuba.

• The Constitutional Union Party was formed by former Whigs and Know-Nothings.  They nominated John Bellas as their presidential candidate.

The Disruption of Democrats

• The divided democrats met in Charleston, with Douglas as their leading presidential candidate

• The southern fire-eaters didn’t like him and thought of him as a traitor

• For his unpopular stand on the Lecompton Constitution and the Freeport Doctrine

• Most of the cotton states walked out

• The remainder couldn’t get a ⅔ vote, so the entire body dissolved

• Two separate conventions nominated candidates for the Democratic party in Baltimore

• A middle party called the Constitutional Union party nominated John Bell for the election

A Rail-Splitter Splits the Union

• The Republican Party met in Chicago and nominated Abraham Lincoln as their presidential candidate.

• The Republican platform appealed to nearly every part of the nation.  For the free-soilers, the Republicans supported the non-extension of slavery. For the northern manufacturers, they supported a protective tariff. For the immigrants, the supported no abridgement of rights. For the Northwest, they supported a Pacific railroad. For the West, they supported internal improvements at federal expense. For the farmers, they supported free homesteads (plots of land) from the public domain.

• The Southerners said that if Abraham Lincoln was elected as President, the Union would split.

The Election of 1860

• Abraham Lincoln won the election of 1860, but he did not win with the popular vote.  60% of the nation voted for another candidate.  10 southern states didn't even allow Lincoln to appear on the ballot.

• South Carolina was happy at the outcome of the election because it now had a reason to secede.

• Even though the Republicans won the presidential election, they did not control the House of Representatives, the Senate, or the Supreme Court.

The Collapse of Compromise

• The Crittenden amendments to the Constitution were designed to appease the South.  The amendments prohibited slavery in territories north of 360 30', but it permitted slavery in the territories south of this line. Future states (north and south of this line) would get to vote on the issue of slavery. President Lincoln rejected the amendments.

The Secessionist Exodus

• In December 1860, South Carolina's legislature met in Charleston and voted unanimously to secede.  6 other states joined South Carolina:  Alabama, Mississippi, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, and Texas.

• The 7 seceders met at Montgomery, Alabama in February 1861 and created a government known as the Confederate States of America.  The states chose Jefferson Davis, a recent member of the U.S. Senate from Mississippi, as President.

• During this time of secession, Buchanan was still the "lame duck" president, because Lincoln was not sworn in until 1861. President Buchanan did not hold the seceders in the Union by force because he was surrounded by pro-southern advisors and he could find no authority in the Constitution to stop them with force. Another reason that force was not used was because at the time, the Union's army was needed to control the Indians of the West. The Northerners were not eager to use force against the Southerners because that would have ended the possibility of peaceful negotiations

Farewell to Union

• The southern states seceded, fearing that the Republican Party would threaten their rights to own slaves.

• Many southerners felt that their secession would be unopposed by the North. They assumed that the northern manufacturers and bankers, dependent upon southern cotton and markets, wouldn't dare cut off the South