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61 Cards in this Set
- Front
- Back
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Fugitive Slave Law
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1850; In payment for Southern support for California's admission to the Union as a free state and ending the slave trade in the District of Columbia, Congress enacted the Fugitive Slave Act to assist the South with maintaining a tight rein on slaveholders’ property. The new law created a force of federal commissioners empowered to pursue fugitive slaves in any state and return them to their owners. No statute of limitations applied, so that even those slaves who had been free for many years could be (and were) returned. A captured runaway could not testify on his own behalf and was not entitled to a court trial. The commissioners received a fee of 10 dollars for every slave returned; the fee was reduced to five dollars if the accused slave were released. The use of the law angered Northerners and prompted Stowe to write Uncle Tom’s Cabin.
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Uncle Tom's Cabin
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The author, Harriet Beecher Stowe, was the daughter of the prominent Congregational clergyman, the Reverend Lyman Beecher. The book was an immediate success, even in the South where it was dubbed abolitionist propaganda. It was highly romantic and stereotypical, but it served to personalize slavery and its horrors for many readers throughout the world.
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Ostend Manifesto
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1854; A recent rebellion in Haiti spurred some Spanish officials to consider emancipation. The Southerners did not want freed slaves so close to their shores and others thought Manifest Destiny should be extended to Cuba. Three American diplomats, Pierre Soulé (minister to Spain), James Buchanan (minister to Britain), and John Y. Mason (minister to France) met in Ostend, Belgium and issued a warning to Spain that it must sell Cuba to the United States or risk having it taken by force. This statement had not been authorized by the Pierce administration and was immediately repudiated. Reaction, both at home and abroad, was extremely negative.
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Gadsden Purchase
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Davis dispatched James Gadsden, a railroad agent and promoter, to Mexico City in 1853 to secure by purchase the Mexican lands immediately south of the Gila River and, if possible, lower California. Experiencing severe financial difficulties, Mexican President Santa Anna accepted Gadsden’s former proposal. This gave the U.S. possession of the Mesilla Valley south of the Gila River, an area of nearly 30,000 square miles. In return the Mexicans received $10 million. Southern politicians badly wanted to approve the treaty and secure their railroad route. Northern interests objected to any more land that could become slave territory and did not want to give any support to the southern railroad idea. The treaty was eventually ratified by a very close vote in 1854.
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"Bleeding Kansas"
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Term used by Horace Greeley of the New York Tribune to describe the violent hostilities between pro and antislavery forces in the Kansas territory during the mid and late 1850s.
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Stephen A. Douglas
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An ardent expansionist, advocating the annexation of Cuba and the entirety of the Oregon Territory. He was a supporter of the Mexican War. In the Senate Douglas chaired the influential Committee on Territories, which guided territories to statehood. With Henry Clay he drafted the component bills of the Compromise of 1850. Douglas coined the term “popular sovereignty” and urged that doctrine's acceptance as a solution to the problems of the extension of slavery in the territories. He also was the prime force behind the Kansas-Nebraska Act in 1854.
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Kansas-Nebraska Act
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Douglas was anxious to see the unorganized region developed. Part of his motivation was personal gain—he was a heavy speculator in western lands and also, as a resident of Chicago, supportive of the development of the central route for a transcontinental railroad. Further, an exposure on the national stage might be helpful to his considerable presidential ambitions. Under the act, the question of slavery, which had seemingly been answered, was to be decided by "popular sovereignty." The effect of this proposal was to repeal the Missouri Compromise, a prospect that enraged antislavery forces and most Northerners. Not content, the Southern leaders insisted on a formal amendment which specifically repealed the slavery provisions of the compromise. The passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act exerted a tremendous impact, which included:
•The reopening of the slavery question in the territories with almost immediate tragic results in “Bleeding Kansas” •The president's hope for reelection dashed •The complete realignment of the major political parties •The Democrats lost influence in the North and were to become the regional proslavery party of the South •The Whig Party, which had opposed the Kansas-Nebraska Act, died in the South and was weakened in the North •A new Republican Party emerged as an immediate political force, drawing in anti-Nebraska Whigs and Democrats. |
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Charles Sumner
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Ardent abolitionist senator from Massachusetts. Delivered a two-day speech titled “The Crime Against Kansas.” He described excesses that occurred there and the South’s complicity in them. Only some of what he said was true. A specific target of his invective was Sen. Andrew P. Butler of South Carolina, who was not present during the speech.
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Sumner-Brooks Affair
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In response to Sumner’ speech, Butler’s nephew, Congressman Preston Brooks, attacked Sumner with a cane while he was seated at his desk in the Senate chamber. Sumner was beaten into unconsciousness, rendering him incapable of resuming his duties for more than three years. As a mark of how deep the divide was between the two sections, “Bully” Brooks became an instant hero in the South. Sumner was seen as a near martyr in the North. Massachusetts reelected him while he was still unable to take his seat in the Senate.
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Know-Nothing Party
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the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854 had split the Whig party between the Conscience Whigs and the Cotton Whigs. The Cotton Whigs joined the Democratic Party; the Conscience Whigs formed the Know-Nothing party, which essentially avoided all issues. This party became the American party, and ran Fillmore in the election of 1856.
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James Buchanan
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(April 23, 1791 - June 1, 1868) was the 15th (1857-1861) President of the United States. He has been criticized for failing to take any positive action in order to attempt to prevent the country from sliding into schism and civil war. A democrat and a racist.
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John C. Freemont
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(January 21, 1813-July 13, 1890) was a military officer, an explorer, and the first candidate of the United States Republican Party for the office of President of the United States in 1856.
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Freeport Doctrine
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A trap Lincoln set for Douglas in their debates. Douglas had to say he supported the Constitution and therefore the Dred Scott Decision, but this seemed to contradict his support of Popular Sovereignty. His response when posed with this dilemma was the weak Free Doctrine, which stated that any territory, by "unfriendly legislation", could exclude slavery, no matter what the action of the Supreme Court. This lost him a lot of popularity in the South.
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Lincoln-Douglas Debates
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a series of famous debates between the two great men, both running to be senator of Illinois. These debates marked Lincoln’s debut on the political scene, and also led to the famous Freeport Doctrine.
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Dred Scott v. Sanford
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A key Supreme Court Decision that said that slaves were not citizens, and therefore could not sue; and, being property, they could be taken anywhere (free or slave) like a pocket watch and be protected by the Constitution. Also repealed the Missouri Compromise (slavery could now go north of 36°30’).
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Constitutional Union Party
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A union of border state Whigs and the American party (Conscience Whigs) who ran John Bell. They stood for the Constitution.
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Election of 1860
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Lincoln’s election. Lincoln completely abandoned the Southern states, and won by campaigning in the North, even with only 39% of the popular vote. The democrats split over their nomination, with the North for Douglas, and the South for Breckinridge. That crazy Constitutional party ran Bell.
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Lecompton Constitution
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A proposed pro-slavery constitution for Kansas. Buchanan and the Senate approved it, but it was eventually voted down in the House in 1858. Eventually a new anti-slavery constitution was drawn up. On January 29, 1861, Kansas was admitted to the Union as a free state.
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Crittenden Compromise
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1860; an unsuccessful effort to avert the Civil War. Senator John J. Crittenden, a KY Whig and disciple of Henry Clay, proposed six constitutional amendments and four resolutions. The amendments made major concessions to southern concerns. They forbade the abolition of slavery on federal land in slaveholding states, compensated owners of runaway slaves, and restored the Missouri Compromise line of 36?30, which had been repealed in the Kansas-Nebraska Act. One amendment guaranteed that future constitutional amendments could not change the other five amendments or the three-fifths and fugitive slave clauses of the Constitution. Crittenden's proposals also called for the repeal of northern personal liberty laws. Aware of congressional divisions, Crittenden urged that his plan be submitted to a nationwide vote. Lincoln opposed it.
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Homestead Act
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1862; an act to secure homesteads to actual settlers on the public domain. Designed to spur Western migration, the Act culminated a twenty-year battle to distribute public lands to citizens willing to farm. Concerned free land would lower property values and reduce the cheap labor supply, Northern businessmen opposed the movement. Unlikely allies, Southerners feared homesteaders would add their voices to the call for abolition of slavery. With Southerners out of the picture in 1862, the legislation finally passed.
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Morrill Land Grant Act
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1862; an act Donating Public Lands to the several States and Territories which may provide Colleges for the Benefit of Agriculture and Mechanic Arts. Established the Land Grant university system. The new piece of legislation introduced by U.S. Representative Justin Smith Morrill of Vermont granted to each state 30,000 acres of public land for each Senator and Representative under apportionment based on the 1860 census. Proceeds from the sale of these lands were to be invested in a perpetual endowment fund which would provide support for colleges of agriculture and mechanical arts in each of the states.
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Free Soil, Free Labor
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Organized in 1848 to oppose the extension of slavery into the territories newly acquired by the United States from Mexico.
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New England Emigrant Aid Society
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Sparked from the KS-NE Act. There was little question that Nebraska would prohibit slavery for presumably she was too far north for the institution to survive. The South on the other hand assumed that Kansas was destined for slavery. However, the early activities of Northern abolitionists, who were determined not to let Kansas go by default, spurred both the North and South to send in every settler they could. In the North one of the organizations created to encourage abolitionist settlement of Kansas was The Massachusetts Emigrant Aid Company (renamed to New England Emigrant Aid Soc). Incorporated under the guidance of Eli Thayer of Worcester in April, 1854, the company was a venture designed both for benevolence and moneymaking.
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Border Ruffians
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Missouri residents who in the 1850s entered the territory of KS to ensure that it would become a slave state. At a time when antislavery forces were working to make Kansas a free state, the "border ruffians" voted fraudulently in Kansas elections and sought to intimidate the antislavery people through violence. Federal troops finally intervened to halt the lawlessness.
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John Brown
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Led a righteous crusade against slavery, born of religious conviction -- and carried out with shocking violence. Would not be deterred from his mission of abolishing slavery. On October 16, 1859, he led 21 men on a raid of the federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry, Virginia. His plan to arm slaves with the weapons he and his men seized from the arsenal was thwarted, however, by local farmers, militiamen, and Marines led by Robert E. Lee. Within 36 hours of the attack, most of Brown's men had been killed or captured. Tried and convicted of treason.
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Emancipation Proclamation
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Declared "that all persons held as slaves" within the rebellious states "are, and henceforward shall be free." Was limited in many ways. It applied only to states that had seceded from the Union, leaving slavery untouched in the loyal border states. It also expressly exempted parts of the Confederacy that had already come under Northern control. Most important, the freedom it promised depended upon Union military victory. Although the Proclamation did not immediately free a single slave, it fundamentally transformed the character of the war. From the first days of the Civil War, slaves had acted to secure their own liberty. The Proclamation confirmed their insistence that the war for the Union must become a war for freedom. It added moral force to the Union cause and strengthened the Union both militarily and politically.
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Jefferson Davis
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Only President of the Confederacy. Born in KY, though a leading spokesman for southern rights. Although he did not advocate immediate secession following Lincoln's election, Davis accepted his state's decision to leave the Union. With the formation of the Confederacy, he hoped for a high military position, and when news arrived at Brierfield of his selection as provisional President, his wife described him as "so grieved that I feared some evil had befallen our family." Davis, nevertheless, accepted the position, and on February 18, 1861 was inaugurated President in Richmond, VA, the capital of the Confederacy.
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Gettysburg
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July 2-4 1863; Attempt by Confederacy to invade northeast, Lee’s army met Union forces in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania led by Meade who occupied high ground. Lee directly attacked the strongest part of the Union line which proved to be disastrous. The Confederate army then retreated back to the Potomac. Considered the turning point of the war for the North.
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George B. McClellan
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Became General in Chief of Union forces after the disaster at Bull Run (July 21, 1861) Proved to be generally unsuccessful excepting a win at Antietam Creek Maryland (September 17, 1862)
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Vicksburg
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May 22-July 4, 1863; Vicksburg was an almost inaccessible Confederate fort that stood between the North and control of the Mississippi River. Grant lay siege to the city on May 22 and bombarded until the surrender on Independence day (the same day Lee began to withdraw from Gettysburg)
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Election of 1864
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Lincoln (Rep.) vs. McClellan (Dem.) Lincoln wins: popular vote 2,218,388 to 1,812,807 and electoral vote 212 to 21 (the 11 secessionist states did not vote!)
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Shiloh
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April 6-7, 1862; Battle won by Union. A surprise attack by the South, North was trapped by Tennessee River, but was saved by the timely arrival of reinforcements, South retreated to Corinth on April 7.
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Robert E. Lee
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Successor to Confederate general Joseph E. Johnston (wounded at Battle of 7 Pines May 31-June 1, 1862) Remained General in Chief until end of the war. Brilliant military genius.
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Appomattox
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April 9, 1865; final battle of the war. Lee recognizes the hopelessness of further resistance. Lee surrendered his army at Appomattox Courthouse.
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Reconstruction
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1863-1877; Period immediately following the Civil War. Focused on rebuilding the South and enforcing the rights and freedoms of blacks.
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Freedmen's Bureau
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1865; Agency set up to aid former slaves in adjusting themselves to freedom. It furnished food and clothing to needy blacks and helped them get jobs.
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Wade-Davis Bill
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1864; Bill declared that the Reconstruction of the South was a legislative, not executive, matter. It was an attempt to weaken the power of the president. Lincoln vetoed it. Wade-Davis Manifesto said Lincoln was acting like a dictator by vetoing.
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Black Codes
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Restrictions on the freedom of former slaves, passed by Southern governments
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Tenure of Office Act
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1866; Enacted by radical Congress, it forbade the president from removing civil officers without consent of the Senate. It was meant to prevent Johnson from removing radicals from office. Johnson broke this law when he fired a radical Republican from his cabinet, and he was impeached for this "crime".
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Scalawags
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A derogatory term for Southerners who were working with the North to buy up land from desperate Southerners.
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Carpetbaggers
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A derogatory term applied to Northerners who migrated south during the Reconstruction to take advantage of opportunities to advance their own fortunes by buying up land from desperate Southerners and by manipulating new black voters to obtain lucrative government contracts.
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Whiskey Ring
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was an affair made public in 1875, involved a national liquor tax evasion scheme where indictments were brought against 86 government officials, including the U.S. Secretary of Treasury, Bristow and President Ulysses S. Grant’s private secretary, Babcock.
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"Greenbacks"
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During the Civil War the government was unable to come up with sufficient finances and as a result suspended specie payments and issued nearly $450 million in paper money. These “greenbacks” did not receive wide support since people were accustomed to money readily convertible into gold or silver. Greenbacks threatened inflation. After the war, there was much support for withdrawing greenbacks from circulation. In 1874 a bill to increase the supply of greenbacks was defeated in a Republican-dominated Congress only by the veto of President Grant. The next year Congress voted to resume specie payments, but in order to avoid a party split on the question, the Republicans agreed to allow $300 million in greenbacks to remain in circulation and to postpone actual resumption of specie payments until 1879.
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Tweed Ring
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Corrupt big-city bosses in NYC; they “probably made off with more money than all the southern thieves, black and white, combined.”
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Ku Klux Klan Act
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1871; Bill authorized the president to suppress terrorist organizations by force and to impose harsh penalties on them. President Ulysses S. Grant seldom used the authority before the Supreme Court, in 1882, declared the Ku Klux Klan Act to be unconstitutional. Was Congress' attempt to put an end to the policies of terrorism, intimidation, and violence that the Klan. The law unfortunately failed to eradicate the Klan or abolish the continued use of fear tactics and brutality against blacks and supportive whites.
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Freedmen's Bureau
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1865; Agency set up to aid former slaves in adjusting themselves to freedom. It furnished food and clothing to needy blacks and helped them get jobs.
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Wade-Davis Bill
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1864; Bill declared that the Reconstruction of the South was a legislative, not executive, matter. It was an attempt to weaken the power of the president. Lincoln vetoed it. Wade-Davis Manifesto said Lincoln was acting like a dictator by vetoing.
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Black Codes
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Restrictions on the freedom of former slaves, passed by Southern governments
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Tenure of Office Act
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1866; Enacted by radical Congress, it forbade the president from removing civil officers without consent of the Senate. It was meant to prevent Johnson from removing radicals from office. Johnson broke this law when he fired a radical Republican from his cabinet, and he was impeached for this "crime".
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Scalawags
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A derogatory term for Southerners who were working with the North to buy up land from desperate Southerners.
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Carpetbaggers
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A derogatory term applied to Northerners who migrated south during the Reconstruction to take advantage of opportunities to advance their own fortunes by buying up land from desperate Southerners and by manipulating new black voters to obtain lucrative government contracts.
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Whiskey Ring
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was an affair made public in 1875, involved a national liquor tax evasion scheme where indictments were brought against 86 government officials, including the U.S. Secretary of Treasury, Bristow and President Ulysses S. Grant’s private secretary, Babcock.
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"Greenbacks"
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During the Civil War the government was unable to come up with sufficient finances and as a result suspended specie payments and issued nearly $450 million in paper money. These “greenbacks” did not receive wide support since people were accustomed to money readily convertible into gold or silver. Greenbacks threatened inflation. After the war, there was much support for withdrawing greenbacks from circulation. In 1874 a bill to increase the supply of greenbacks was defeated in a Republican-dominated Congress only by the veto of President Grant. The next year Congress voted to resume specie payments, but in order to avoid a party split on the question, the Republicans agreed to allow $300 million in greenbacks to remain in circulation and to postpone actual resumption of specie payments until 1879.
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Tweed Ring
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Corrupt big-city bosses in NYC; they “probably made off with more money than all the southern thieves, black and white, combined.”
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Ku Klux Klan Act
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1871; Bill authorized the president to suppress terrorist organizations by force and to impose harsh penalties on them. President Ulysses S. Grant seldom used the authority before the Supreme Court, in 1882, declared the Ku Klux Klan Act to be unconstitutional. Was Congress' attempt to put an end to the policies of terrorism, intimidation, and violence that the Klan. The law unfortunately failed to eradicate the Klan or abolish the continued use of fear tactics and brutality against blacks and supportive whites.
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Reconstruction Acts of 1867 –
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1. Divided the Confederacy (except Tennessee) into 5 military districts; to get rid of military rule, states had to adopt constitutions guaranteeing blacks the right to vote and ratify the 14th Amendment
2. Required voter registration, supervised election of delegates to the constitutional conventions 3. Clarified procedures |
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Thaddeus Stevens
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Congressman who supported giving freedmen a small plot of land; was motivated by his hatred of the wealthy planter class
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Force Acts
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1870; placed elections under federal jurisdiction, set fines/prison sentences for those caught keeping anyone from voting; passed in response to the KKK
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“Swing Around the Circuit”
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Johnson goes around the North telling them not to ratify the 14th Amendment; they realize he’s a southern Dem and don’t listen – this gives the Reps. the next congressional election
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Disputed Election of 1876
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When it appeared that Tilden (Dem candidate) was going to win, local election officials in FL, SC, LO destroyed Dem. ballots, giving Hayes (Rep candidate) the election. A committee was formed, but it was partisan because the only neutral party resigned from the Supreme Court to be a senator in IL. They found election fraud from both parties but decided to give Hayes the presidency anyway. Dems were furious but they settled things w/the Compromise of 1877.
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Horace Greeley and the Liberal Republicans
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nominated for prez b/c they were disappointed by Grant’s lack of civil reforms and alarmed by corruption; “their liberalism was of the laissez-faire variety; they were for low tariffs and sound money and against measures benefiting particular groups…They disparaged universal suffrage.” Their defection hurt the Republicans in Congressional elections and strangely, the Dems also nominated Greeley, although Grant easily won.
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