Four Heavy Straws and One Weak Camel

Prelude to the Civil War

Missouri Compromise

• The compromise was meant to regulate slavery in the Western States.

• It prohibited slavery in the former Louisiana Territory, north of the 36th Parallel except within the boundaries of the proposed state of Missouri

• To balance the addition of a slave state (Missouri), a new northern free state was added (Maine).

Dred Scott

• Dred Scott was a slave from Missouri who moved with his owner to Illinois, Wisconsin, and then back to Missouri, where his owner promptly died.

• Scott filed a lawsuit arguing that since he lived in a free state, he had become a free man.

• The Supreme Court disagreed.

Dred Scott Decision

• They ruled that:– Scott could not file a lawsuit, because he was a

slave and slaves can’t be citizens.– Slaves are property.– Congress does not have the right to outlaw slavery

in any territory, therefore the Missouri Compromise was unconstitutional.

John Brown’s Raid on Harper’s Ferry

• Brown was a radical abolitionists.• Led 18 men against a Federal armoury in

Virginia, where he hoped that slaves would join him and take part in a revolt, but no slaves arrived.

• His revolt is brutal supressed by Robert E. Lee.• Southerners were outraged by this revolt,

many Northerners consider him a martyr.

Abe’s Ascendancy

• The Republicans –a new party created by those who wanted to keep slavery out of the Western Territories.

• The Democratic Party (Predominately Southerners) were split on the issue of slavery, so they chose two candidates for the Presidential Election of 1860)

• Lincoln wins only the North and wins the elections, many Southerners felt they no longer had a say in the National Government.