A Divided Nation

The Debate over Slavery

Chapter 15, Section 1Pages 476 - 481

Building BackgroundSome reform movements of the 1800s drew stubborn and often violent opposition.

This was especially true of the abolitionist movement.

Pro-slavery supporters fought for laws to protect slavery and to extend the slave system.

These laws were a threat to African Americans in the North.

New Land Renews Slavery DisputesThe United States added more than 500,000 square miles of land as a result of winning the Mexican-American War in 1848.

The additional land caused bitter debate about slavery.

The Missouri Compromise of 1820 had divided the Louisiana Purchase into either free or slave regions.

It prohibited slavery north of latitude 36°30′, but allowed Missouri to come into the Union as a slave state.

New Land Renews Slavery DisputesIn the 1840s, President James K. Polk wanted to extend the requirements of the Missouri Compromise all the way to the West Coast.

This would have divided the land gained from the Mexican Session into two parts – one part free, the other slave.

Others in Congress preferred the concept of popular sovereignty – the idea that political power belongs to the people. The people should decide on banning or allowing slavery.

Wilmot ProvisoSome northerners wanted to outlaw slavery in all parts of the Mexican Cession.

The Wilmot Proviso was proposed stating that “neither slavery nor involuntary servitude shall ever exist in any part of the territory.

The northern-controlled House of Representatives passed the proposal, but the South had more power in the Senate.

The Wilmot Proviso did not pass.

Free-Soil PartyAnti-slavery northerners formed a new political party – the Free-Soil Party.

• The Free-Soil Party supported the Wilmot Proviso.

• They also worried that slave labor would mean fewer jobs for white workers.

• Selected former President Martin Van Buren as their candidate in the election of 1848.

• Only won 10 percent of the popular vote.

The California QuestionMost Californians opposed slavery, which had been illegal when the state was part of Mexico.

Also most of the forty-niners had come from free states.

But if California became a free state, it would upset the balance between free and slave states.

Compromise of 1850Senator Henry Clay of Kentucky who helped settle the Missouri crisis of 1819-20 and the Nullification Crisis of 1832-33 contributed to the resolution of the California Question.

He developed another plan to help maintain the nation’s peace.

His ideas were designed to give both sides things that they wanted.

Compromise of 18501. California would enter the Union as a free state.

2. The rest of the Mexican Cession would be federal land. In this territory, popular sovereignty would decide the issue of slavery.

3. Texas would give up land east of the upper Rio Grande.

4. The slave trade – but not slavery – would stop in the nation’s capital.

5. A more effective fugitive slave law would be passed.

Compromise of 1850

With the Compromise of 1850, California was able to enter the Union as a free state.

The rest of the Mexican Cession was divided into two territories – Utah and New Mexico.

The people of the new territories would be allowed to decide whether to permit slavery or not.

Texas gave up land to New Mexico for federal financial aid.

Slave trade was outlawed in Washington, D.C.

Fugitive Slave ActThe newly passed Fugitive Slave Act made it a crime to help runaway slaves and allowed officials to arrest those slaves in free areas.

People helping runaway slaves could be fined as much as $1,000 and be sentenced to six months in jail.

Commissioners who rejected the slaveholder’s claim earned $5.00 while those who returned suspected fugitive slaves earned $10.00.

Fugitive Slave ActThousand of northern African Americans fled to Canada in fear of being taken back into slavery. In the ten years after Congress passed the Fugitive Slave Act some 343 fugitive slave cases were reviewed.

The accused fugitives were declared free in only 11 cases.

Northerners disliked the idea of a trial without a jury. They also disapproved of the higher commissioners’ fees for returning slaves.

Uncle Tom’s CabinAntislavery literature was used to influence people’s opinions.

One major piece of work was Uncle Tom’s Cabin, an antislavery book written by Harriet Beecher Stowe.

This novel, focused on the harsh realities of slavery electrified the nation and sparked outrage in the South.

More than two million copies were sold within ten years of its original publication.

Uncle Tom’s CabinThe impact of Uncle Tom’s Cabin is suggested by Stowe’s reported meeting with Abraham Lincoln in 1862, a year after the start of the Civil War.

Lincoln supposedly said to Stowe that she was “the little lady who me this big war.”