Unit 5 Vocabulary

Abolitionism

• Movement to end slavery

• Encouraged women to fight for the right to vote, because they participated in the movement

• Increased tension between the North and South

• Made slavery a significant issue in American politics

Nat Turner

• Led a slave rebellion in Virginia

• Increases tension between North and South

• Southerners increase restrictions on slaves and free blacks and Northerners say this proves slaves need to be free

William Lloyd Garrison

• Publisher of the Liberator

• His newspaper supported abolitionism and brought more people to the cause

Fredrick Douglass

• Former slave who becomes famous abolitionist writer and speaker

• He was an influential abolitionist because he experienced slavery himself

Grimke Sisters

• Southern women who were abolitionists

• What they said was important because they experienced how bad slavery was from the slave owner's perspective

States’ rights ideology

• Belief that the power of the states should be protected

• Wanted states to have more power than federal government

• Commonly held belief of southerners before the Civil War

• Sectionalism: putting regional interests over national interests

Nullification

• When a state refuses to recognize a federal law because it considers it unconstitutional

• South Carolina, encouraged by John C. Calhoun, wants to nullify the Tariff of 1828, Jackson forces them to back down

• The belief in nullification is associated with the belief in states’ rights

Missouri Compromise

• Tried to resolve conflict over slavery in the West by saying all states except Missouri north of the 36’30 line would be free states

• Only temporarily solved the conflict

Compromise of 1850

• California is a free state

• Other territories would decide based upon popular sovereignty (a vote)

• Fugitive Slave Act (runaway slaves were returned to the South)

War with Mexico

• War between U.S. and Mexico from 1846-1848, in which the U.S. wins land from Mexico in the West

• New land meant new arguments over slavery in the West

Wilmot Proviso

• Banned slavery in territories won during the War with Mexico

• Divided Congress along regional lines

Kansas-Nebraska Act

• The territories of Kansas and Nebraska would vote to decide whether they would become slave or free states.

• The competition to gain votes resulted in violence between pro-slavery groups and abolitionists (Bleeding Kansas)

Popular Sovereignty

• A system where people vote to decide what to do on an issue

• Used to decide whether some territories would be free or slave

Dred Scott Decision

• A slave (Scott) sued for freedom. He had been brought into a free state, so he said he was no longer a slave.

• Court ruled that slaves were property and that owners had the right to keep them even in free states.

John Brown’s Raid

• John Brown raided the US Army arsenal in Harper’s Ferry, Virginia.

• He wanted to start a slave rebellion, but he was captured and hanged.

• Divides the North and South even more. North saw him as a martyr and the South said he was a terrorist.

Economic Disparity

• The North had a larger population, more railroads and more factories than the South

• This gave the North an advantage over the South and helped them win the Civil War