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The Civil War and the Expansion of Slavery
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Professor Eric Foner argues, ". . . the final collapse of American politics and of the American nation takes place as the country is torn apart by the question of the expansion of slavery."
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Focusing on crucial documents from the 1850s and 1860s, evaluate Professor Foner's argument that the "question of the expansion of slavery" caused the Civil War. Specify whether you partly or entirely agree or disagree. Use your knowledge of the time period and the sources provided to support your arguments.
Primary source: John C. Calhoun, "The Clay Compromise Measures," speech to the Senate, 1850.
Background information: John C. Calhoun became the South's most powerful advocate as senator from South Carolina for most of the period from 1832 to 1850.
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One of the causes is, undoubtedly, to be traced to the long-continued agitation of the slave question on the part of the North, and the many aggressions which they have made on the rights of the South during the time. I will not enumerate them at present, as it will be done hereafter in its proper place.
There is another lying back of it—with which this is intimately connected—that may be regarded as the great and primary cause. This is to be found in the fact that the equilibrium between the two sections in the government as it stood when the Constitution was ratified and the government put in action has been destroyed. At that time there was nearly a perfect equilibrium between the two, which afforded ample means to each to protect itself against the aggression of the other; but, as it now stands, one section has the exclusive power of controlling the government, which leaves the other without any adequate means of protecting itself against its encroachment and oppression.
The result of the whole is to give the Northern section a predominance in every department of the government, and thereby concentrate in it the two elements which constitute the federal government: a majority of States, and a majority of their population, estimated in federal numbers. Whatever section concentrates the two in itself possesses the control of the entire government.
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John C. Calhoun, "The Clay Compromise Measures," speech to the Senate (4 March 1850), at http://www.nationalcenter.org/CalhounClayCompromise.html.
Courtesy of the National Center for Public Policy Research.
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Primary source: "Forcing Slavery Down the Throat of a Freesoiler," political cartoon, 1856.
Background information: In this political cartoon, a bearded "freesoiler" is restrained.
"Forcing Slavery Down the Throat of a Freesoiler," political cartoon at American Political Prints, 1766-1876, at http://loc.harpweek.com/LCPoliticalCartoons/Disk6/5w/3b38367v5w.jpg.
Courtesy of HarpWeek.
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Primary source: “Bleeding Kansas . . . ,” daguerrotype, 1856.
Background information: In the summer of 1856, advocates of Free States flocked to Kansas in anticipation of the popular sovereignty vote.
“Bleeding Kansas, a daguerrotype of a free-state artillery battery, 1856," in Who Built America? American Social History Project (New York: Pantheon Books, 1989): 400.
Kansas State Historical Society.
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Primary source: "Republican Platform of 1856."
Background information: While the Democrats endorsed popular sovereignty to decide the issue of slavery in the Territories, the Republicans took the stand put forth here.
This Convention of Delegates, assembled in pursuance of a call addressed to the people of the United States, without regard to past political differences or divisions, who are opposed to the repeal of the Missouri Compromise; to the policy of the present Administration; to the extension [of] Slavery into Free Territory; in favor of the admission of Kansas as a Free State; of restoring the action of the Federal Government to the principles of Washington and Jefferson; and for the purpose of presenting candidates for the offices of President and Vice–President, do
Resolved: That the maintenance of the principles promulgated in the Declaration of Independence, and embodied in the Federal Constitution are essential to the preservation of our Republican institutions, and that the Federal Constitution, the rights of the States, and the union of the States, must and shall be preserved.
Resolved: That, with our Republican fathers, we hold it to be a self–evident truth, that all men are endowed with the inalienable right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, and that the primary object and ulterior design of our Federal Government were to secure these rights to all persons under its exclusive jurisdiction; that, as our Republican fathers, when they had abolished Slavery in all our National Territory, ordained that no person shall be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law, it becomes our duty to maintain this provision of the Constitution against all attempts to violate it for the purpose of establishing Slavery in the Territories of the United States by positive legislation, prohibiting its existence or extension therein. That we deny the authority of Congress, of a Territorial Legislation, of any individual, or association of individuals, to give legal existence to Slavery in any Territory of the United States, while the present Constitution shall be maintained.
Resolved: That the Constitution confers upon Congress sovereign powers over the Territories of the United States for their government; and that in the exercise of this power, it is both the right and the imperative duty of Congress to prohibit in the Territories those twin relics of barbarism—Polygamy, and Slavery.
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"Republican Platform of 1856," in National Party Platforms, 1840–1956, comp. Kirk H. Porter and Donald Bruce Johnson, vol. 1 (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1956), 27, at http://ushistory.org/gop/hist/1856republicanplatform.htm.
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Primary source: Abraham Lincoln, "A House Divided," speech, 1858.
Background information: Abraham Lincoln accepts the Republican Party's nomination for U.S. senator from Illinois. Lincoln ran against Stephen A. Douglas, the proponent of popular sovereignty.
If we could first know where we are, and whither we are tending, we could then better judge what to do, and how to do it. We are now far into the fifth year, since a policy was initiated, with the avowed object, and confident promise, of putting an end to slavery agitation.
Under the operation of that policy, that agitation has not only, not ceased, but has constantly augmented.
In my opinion, it will not cease, until a crisis shall have been reached and passed.
"A house divided against itself cannot stand."
I believe this government cannot endure, permanently half slave and half free.
I do not expect the Union to be dissolved—I do not expect the house to fall—but I do expect it will cease to be divided.
It will become all one thing, or all the other.
Either the opponents of slavery, will arrest the further spread of it, and place it where the public mind shall rest in the belief that it is in course of ultimate extinction; or its advocates will push it forward, till it shall become alike lawful in all the States, old as well as new—North as well as South.
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Abraham Lincoln, "'A House Divided': Speech at Springfield, Illinois," in The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln, ed. Roy P. Basler, vol. 2 (New Brunswick: Rutgers, 1953), 461–68.
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Primary source: "The Democratic Platform of 1860."
Background information: In 1860, the Democratic Party split along sectional lines, leaving the Southern Democrats as the dominant party of the South. In the 1860 presidential election, the Southern Democrats won every state of the Deep South, the first states to secede.
Resolved, That the platform adopted by the Democratic party at Cincinnati be affirmed, with the following explanatory resolutions:
1. That the Government of a Territory organized by an act of Congress is provisional and temporary, and during its existence all citizens of the United States have an equal right to settle with their property in the Territory, without their rights, either of person or property, being destroyed or impaired by Congressional or Territorial legislation.
2. That it is the duty of the Federal Government, in all its departments, to protect, when necessary, the rights of persons and property in the Territories, and wherever else its constitutional authority extends.
3. That when the settlers in a Territory, having an adequate population, form a State Constitution, the right of sovereignty commences, and being consummated by admission into the Union, they stand on an equal footing with the people of other States, and the State thus organized ought to be admitted into the Federal Union, whether its constitution prohibits or recognizes the institution of slavery.
Resolved, That the Democratic party are in favor of the acquisition of the Island of Cuba, on such terms as shall be honorable to ourselves and just to Spain, at the earliest practicable moment.
Resolved, That the enactments of State Legislatures to defeat the faithful execution of the Fugitive Slave Law are hostile in character, subversive of the Constitution, and revolutionary in their effect.
Resolved, That the Democracy of the United States recognize it as the imperative duty of this Government to protect the naturalized citizen in all his rights, whether at home or in foreign lands, to the same extent as its native-born citizens.
WHEREAS, One of the greatest necessities of the age, in a political, commercial, postal and military point of view, is speedy communication between the Atlantic and Pacific coasts. Therefore be it
Resolved, that the National Democratic party do hereby pledge themselves to use every means in their power to secure the passage of some bill, to the extent of the constitutional authority of Congress, for the construction of a Pacific Railroad from the Mississippi River to the Pacific Ocean, at the earliest practicable moment.
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"The Democratic Platform of 1860," in National Party Platforms, 1840–1956, comp. Kirk H. Porter and Donald Bruce Johnson, vol. 1 (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1956), 31.
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Primary source: "The Union Must and Shall Be Preserved," political cartoon, c. 1860.
Background information: A campaign banner for the Republican ticket in 1860.
"The Union Must and Shall Be Preserved," in Bernard F. Reilly Jr., American Political Prints, 1766–1876: A Catalog of the Collections in the Library of Congress, 1991.
Courtesy of HarpWeek.
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Primary source: John J. Crittenden, Proposed Amendments, 1860.
Background information: Abraham Lincoln has been elected President and the threat of secession hangs over the Union. What is Crittenden's plan?
Whereas, serious and alarming dissensions have arisen between the Northern and Southern States, concerning the rights and security of the rights of the slaveholding States, and especially their rights in the common territory of the United States; and whereas it is eminently desirable and proper that these dissensions, which now threaten the very existence of this Union, should be permanently quieted and settled by constitutional provisions, which shall do equal justice to all sections, and thereby restore to the people that peace and good will which ought to prevail between all the citizens of the United States: Therefore,
Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled (two–thirds of both Houses concurring), That the following articles be, and are hereby, proposed and submitted as amendments to the Constitution of the United States, which shall be valid to all intents and purposes, as part of said Constitution, when ratified by conventions of three–fourths of the several States:
ARTICLE I.
In all the territory of the United States now held, or hereafter acquired, situated north of latitude 36° 30', slavery or involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime, is prohibited while such territory shall remain under territorial government. In all the territory south of said line of latitude, slavery of the African race is hereby recognized as existing, and shall not be interfered with by Congress, but shall be protected as property by all the departments of the territorial government during its continuance. And when any Territory, north or south of said line, within such boundaries as Congress may prescribe, shall contain the population requisite for a member of Congress according to the then Federal ratio of representation of the people of the United States, it shall, if its form of government be republican, be admitted into the Union, on an equal footing with the original States, with or without slavery, as the constitution of such new State may provide.
ARTICLE II.
Congress shall have no power to abolish slavery in places under its exclusive jurisdiction, and situate within the limits of States that permit the holding of slaves.
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John J. Crittenden, “Joint Resolution Proposing certain Amendments to the Constitution of the United States," Bills and Resolutions, Senate, 36th Congress, 2nd Session, 18 December 1860; reproduced at Library of Congress, American Memory, A Century of Lawmaking for a New Nation: U.S. Congressional Documents and Debates, 1774–1875, at http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/amerdoc/critten.htm.
Courtesy of The Avalon Project at Yale Law School.
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Primary source: Editorial, 1860.
Background information: This editorial responds to Crittenden's proposal to amend the Constitution.
Senator Crittenden's Compromise Proposition
Senator Crittenden is among the least extortionate representatives of the Pro–Slavery section of the Union. We may reasonably assume, therefore, that he would be content with as mild concessions as any of his cotemporaries. And yet he demands, as the basis of another "final settlement," the recognition of the right of Slavery to all the Territory, now or hereafter acquired, South of 36:30!
He follows up this demand by others, viz:
The recognition of Slavery as property, and its protection in all the Territories south of 36:30:
No Congressional interference with Slaves in the States, or in the District of Columbia:
No interference with the transportation of Slaves from one State to another, whether by land, river or sea:
Compensation for rescued Fugitive Slaves:
The right of Congress to demand the repeal of State laws calculated to impede the recovery of fugitives: and
The equalization of the U.S. Commissioners' Fees, whether the claimed fugitive is
surrendered or not.
These propositions have the merit of distinctness. No one can misunderstand them. But they are partial and one sided; and cannot be deemed to embody that spirit of mutual concession without which it will be quite impossible to effect such an adjustment as will even approximate a "final settlement."
But if this be true of what Senator Crittenden proposes, what may we expect to be the character of the plan which will be satisfactory to Senators Mason or Toombs?
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Editorial, Albany Evening Journal (19 December 1860).
Courtesy of Professor Richard Latner, Department of History, Tulane University.
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Primary source:
A Declaration of the Immediate Causes which Induce and Justify the Secession of the State of Mississippi from the Federal Union, 1861.
Background information: The first state to secede was South Carolina, doing so on December 20, 1860. Before the end of February, all the states of the Deep South (Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Texas) had seceded.
In the momentous step which our State has taken of dissolving its connection with the government of which we so long formed a part, it is but just that we should declare the prominent reasons which have induced our course.
Our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery-- the greatest material interest of the world. Its labor supplies the product which constitutes by far the largest and most important portions of commerce of the earth. These products are peculiar to the climate verging on the tropical regions, and by an imperious law of nature, none but the black race can bear exposure to the tropical sun. These products have become necessities of the world, and a blow at slavery is a blow at commerce and civilization. That blow has been long aimed at the institution, and was at the point of reaching its consummation. There was no choice left us but submission to the mandates of abolition, or a dissolution of the Union, whose principles had been subverted to work out our ruin.
That we do not overstate the dangers to our institution, a reference to a few facts will sufficiently prove.
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A Declaration of the Immediate Causes which Induce and Justify the Secession of the State of Mississippi from the Federal Union, Journal of the State Convention, (Jackson, Miss.: E. Barksdale, State Printer, 1861), 86–8.
Courtesy of The Avalon Project at Yale Law School.
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