Unit 3: The Causes of the Civil War as given by M. Shomaker during the 2013-2014 school year to 8th grade students at CCA.

1. UNIT 3:
CAUSES OF THE
CIVIL WAR
8th Grade US History (CCA 2013-2014)
M. SHOMAKER

2. What led to civil war?
1. Manifest Destiny
2. Trouble in California
3. “Slavery” [there’s much more to this]
4. Failed compromises
5. 1860 election

4. What was
Manifest Destiny?

5. The time has come for everyone to stop treating Texas
as an alien, and to stop thwarting our policy and
hampering our power, limiting our greatness and
checking the fulfillment of our manifest destiny to
overspread the continent allotted by Providence for the
free development of our yearly multiplying millions.
-John O. Sullivan “Annexation” [1845]

10. WHY
NOW?

15. The Mexican War

16. Roots of the
Conflict
• Protestant Texas vs.
Catholic Mexico
• Immigration restrictions
• Mexico forbid slavery

17. James Polk
• Two-term Governor of Tennessee, Speaker of the
House, & won against Whig Henry Clay in 1844
• Ran on “Manifest Destiny”
•US had God-given right to the West
•Annex Texas/Occupy Oregon
• How did his presidency preface war?
•Lower tariffs & independent treasury caused
“boom”
•Gained Oregon Territory & California*

19. Mexican-American War
• Texas was Mexican territory
• Americans were allowed to settle there
• Santa Anna imposed strict stipulations
• Stephen Austin encouraged revolt
• American victory led to annexation debate
(imbalance)

20. TREATY OF
GUADALUPE
HIDALGO

21. Mexican-American War…cont’d.
• Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo ended the war
• Annexed Texas into the US
• Mexican land cession worth $18 million

22. Wilmot Proviso
• Suggested ban on slavery in new territories from
Mexico
• Slaveholders viewed it as an attack
• Led to the creation of the “Free-Soilers”

24. Trouble in California
• President Taylor (1848) courted “Free-Soilers” &
Northern Democrats
• Advised California to apply for statehood quick
• California’s entry was blocked (imbalance)
• Resulted in the “Compromise of 1850”
• Created by Clay, Webster, & Stephen Douglas

25. Compromise of 1850
The Compromise of 1850 demonstrated just
how fractured the country had become over the
issue of slavery.

26. 1
California is a free state
2
New Mexico/Utah Slavery-NR
3
Texas boundaries Slavery-NR
4
Slave trade abolished in D.C.
5
$10 million in reparation
6
Fugitive Slave Act

27. Fugitive
Slave Act

28.  Allowed slave-owners
to use Federal power to
return runaways

29.  No right to trial
 One white accuser
 If accused, even free
blacks could be enslaved
 Divided the Whigs

31. North and South:
A Comparison

32. Slavery
Small % of
plantation owners

33. States & Pop.
23 states + border states
& territories
22 million (4 million)
11 states + limited
border state assistance
9 million (1.2 million with
3.5 million slaves)

34. Economy
100,000 (1.1 million workers)
20,000 (101,000 workers)
20,000 miles of rail
9,000 miles of rail

35. Dred Scott Decision
• Slave Dred Scott sued
for freedom
• Taney court denied
•Blacks were not
citizens
•Congress could not
outlaw slavery
• Denied civil rights and
opened territories to
slavery

36. STATES
RIGHTS

38. 1833
Congress approved
force to crush South
Carolina
S.C.

40. Children…
Yummy!
Henry Clay

46. Bleeding Kansas

50. POPULAR
SOVEREIGNTY

51. Bleeding Kansas
• 1854: Kansas-Nebraska act gave “Popular
Sovereignty”
• Radicals took votes away from settlers
•“Border Ruffians” from Missouri
•“Emigrant Aid Society” from East
• Numbers favored slavery & drafted “Lecompton
Constitution”
• Abolitionists formed separate gov’t. in Lawrence

52. Bleeding Kansas…cont’d.
• 1855: Beginning of the “Wakarusa War”
• 1856: Slave-state supporters sacked Lawrence
• Preston Brooks attacks Charles Sumner

54. Bleeding Kansas…cont’d.
• 1855: Beginning of the “Wakarusa War”
• 1856: Slave-state supporters sacked Lawrence
• Preston Brooks attacks Charles Sumner
• Out of the fray came John Brown

56. john brown

57. chosen by God

58. hunted by creditors

59. a murderous hand

60. a fierce devotion

61. saint or sinner?

62. transplanted from the
east to Kansas

63. intellectually & radically
opposed to slavery

64. <won him the support of
Yankee abolitionists>

65. Pottawatomie Massacre

71. Lincoln
• Elected to US Congress (Whig) in 1846
• Early views on slavery:
•Opposition to slavery’s expansion
•Gradual emancipation
•Colonization
• Put him at odds with both major parties
• Had contradictory views on the issue

72. Lincoln…cont’d.
• “Slavery should not be expanded but left
untouched where it exists.” -Lincoln
•“Slavery must be cut out like a cancer.” -Lincoln
•Passed the Emancipation Proclamation freeing
only slaves in the 11 official Confederate States

82. Antebellum Politics
• Much more diverse than today
• “The Know-Nothings”
•Emerged from splintered Whig party
•Most were “Nativists”
•Hated a few things:
• Irish
• Germans
• Catholics
• Blacks

83. Election of 1860
• After Harper’s Ferry, Republican party grew as
the abolitionist party
• Many Democrats sided with slave-holders
• Lincoln vs. Stephen Douglas
• Lincoln’s moderate views/egalitarian image
helped him in a landslide (Douglas won Missouri)
• Lincoln won and the South was fed up

86. Secession!
• South Carolina voted to secede four days later
• Ten states followed
•Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Texas,
Arkansas, Tennessee, North Carolina, Virginia
•Feb. 1861: C.S.A. founded under Jefferson Davis
•Took advantage of Buchanan’s “lame duck”
• “Crittenden Amendments” failed

87. Proposed Crittenden Compromise, 1860

88. Secession! …cont’d.
•Basis of secession:
•No Constitutional limitation
•“States Rights”
•Powerful anti-slavery Republican party/Northern
interference
•Historical precedent
•Worldwide nationalism
•Not all southerners wanted secession (WV) and
not all northerners wanted war