A Growing Nation

America’s Path to Civil War

Setting the stage

• After the Constitution is ratified, Americans get down to the business of doing business.

• The parts of the nation are different, and have different interests

• Plus, everyone wants the nation to get bigger!

• But the nation is split evenly: 7 free states, 7 slave states

The North

• Mostly settled by English & Dutch • Had small farms with many different crops• Religiously ‘liberal,’ applied equal justice to

society• After Industrial Revolution, northerners built

up factories and cities. Many moved off farms and into jobs at textile (cloth) factories.

MA farm: Note the crops

MA Textile Mill

– Northerners believed they should have the most power because of population, and strength of economy

The South

• Mostly settled by Germans & Scots-Irish• Had mostly large, one crop farms

focused on tobacco and cotton. Both crops required lots of labor

• This is why slavery spread• With cheap labor and demand for cotton

from Northern textile factories, farmers grew more reliant on slavery

Cotton fields today

Cotton fields, pre-war

• Southerners believed they should have the most power because they had the most land (and, if slaves were counted, quite a few people).

Expanding America

• 1803: Louisiana Purchase doubles America’s size. We get MN, IA, MO, OK, NE, KS, ND, SD, MT, ID, WA, OR.

• 1812-14: War of 1812 (fought around here) secures OH, MI, PA, WI, MN

• 1836: Texan War of Independence. TX leaves Mexico, joins US in 1840

• 1846: Mexican War: US gets NM, AZ, CO, WY, NV, CA, UT

Louisiana Purchase

Texas War gains

• Everytime we add territory, we have to decide: Will the state be slave or free?

• 1820: Missouri Compromise – MO comes in as a slave state– ME comes in as a free state. – Says that 36’30” N Lat will be dividing line

between slave & free states

• Compromise of 1850– Admits CA as free state– Authorizes Fugitive Slave Act, which says

any slave captured must be returned– Says other areas gained in MX War get

“popular sovereignty” - the right to choose whether to be slave or free

• 1854: Kansas Nebraska Act– Says any new state can have a vote on

whether it will be slave or free– Means slavery & anti-slavery forces will

rush into new states to sway the vote

Effects

• All of these laws serve to polarize the nation between those VERY pro-slave and those VERY pro-freedom

• Anti-slavery forces form a brand new political party: The Republicans

• America is on the edge of falling apart