Origins+&+Timeline+of+the+Civil+War

= = =Origins and Time line of the American Civil War=

Page editor: Mrs. Z Page updated: April 24, 2008
 * Page authors:** Marley Jane, Molly, Marisa P, Marisa V, Emily, Margaret Mary, Gia A., Liz, Steven, Dennis, Eryka, Nick, Bria, James

Page Contents:
====Sectionalism / Abolition Movement / Missouri Compromise / Nullification Controversy / The Wilmont Proviso / States Rights / Compromise of 1850 / Kansas-Nebraska Act / Bleeding Kansas / John Brown / Dred Scott Decision / 1860 Presidential Election / Secession====

The [|timeline] below shows several events that [|caused] the Civil War.

=1800 - Sectionalism=

The Northern and Southern United states developed into different kinds of societies. The economic interests of the North and South were opposed by each other. The North became primarily industrial and the South's economy was based on agriculture. The North was a manufacturing center, using raw materials to create finished goods. New England, the Northeast and the Midwest had a rapidly growing economy based on family farms, mining, industry, commerce and transportation. They had a large and growing urban population with no slaves outside of the Border States. There was a high birth rate and large numbers of European immigrants. The South was largely comprised of small and large plantations that grew crops such as cotton, which were labor intensive. They became a one crop economy depending on cotton, and therefore, slavery. The Southern population was not growing as quickly as the North's. This made it difficult for the South to maintain control of the national government. Southerners worried about the political decline of their region because the North was growing much faster in terms of population and industrial output. The Mason-Dixon Line seperated the North and the South.

Politically, the South believed that the country formed under the Constitution was formed by consent and agreement, not by force. They also believed that they gained their freedom and independence from England that they still maintained these rights when they entered the Union of states and that the rights were not given up as a requirement to being part of the United States. They believed the Constitution guarenteed the rights of the states to be sovereign and not subject to a central government. The North believed otherwise. The North said the Constitution intended the union of states to be perpetual and that sovereignity could not be divided. =1808 - Abolition Movement=

[|Abolition movements] were part of [|American history] as early as the American Revolution. The Quakers and some founding fathers believed that the idea of freedom found in the Declaration of Independence should extend to all men. Abolitionists wanted to end slavery and they spoke and wrote letters to encourage rebellion against the practice. In 1808, Congress makes slave importation illegal. Slavery was abolished in the North but continued in the South.

Abolitionists helped slaves escape from their masters and they were determined to convince the Northern states to force the Southern states to abolish slavery. In 1833, the [|American Anti-Slavery Society] was established.

=1820 - Missouri Compromise=

Missouri wanted to be admitted to the Union but Missouri was a slave state. This would have upset the balance of slave states and free states in the Congress. Rep. Henry Clay of Kentucky came up with a [|compromise]. Maine was now asking to become part of the Union as a free state. The compromise was called "[|The Missouri Compromise]." Missouri was admitted into the Union as a slave state and Maine was admitted as a free state. Congress drew an imaginary line across the Louisiana territory and said that in the future, there would no slavery in territories north of Missouri's southern border. [|The Missouri Compromise] kept the balance between the slave states and the free states. The Compromise kept the Union together but people were not happy at all. In the North any Congressman who voted for the slave state was called a traitor.

=1828 - 1832: Nullification Controversy=

The Nullification Controversy was a political doctrine that said that states can nullify, or reject, any federal law that they think is unconstitutional. To nullify means to veto, or reject, a law. The controversy was first established in the states of Kentucky and Virginia in 1798. In 1828, the U.S. passed a protective tariff (tax) law on imports and exports that the state of South Carolina felt was unfair and unconstitutional. President Andrew Jackson promised to revise the tariff. However, he didn't revise the law well enough. South Carolina declared the tariffs were unconstitutional and nullified the tariff law by passing the Ordinance of Nullification that forbade the collection of tariffs. President Jackson disagreed with the Ordinance of Nullification and he passed the Force Act that threatened to send federal troops to South Carolina. He also offered a compromise tariff. South Carolina nullified the Force Act, so no federal troops were sent to enforce the federal government's law. South Carolina accepted the compromise tariff in 1833. This laid the foundation for state's rights.

=State's Rights=

From the conception of the Constitution there were two differing opinions on the role of the federal government. State's Rights is an idea in which individual states have more power than the national government. It rested on the theory that in the United States, the ultimate source of power lay in separate states. This was called State Sovereignty. Before the Civil War, the idea appeared on both halves of the country, but during the war, it was mainly a Southern idea. In fact, the preamble to the Confederate Constitution stated "each state acting in its sovereign and independent power..." The North wanted a strong central government. Over the years, the rights of the states would collide with various actions the federal government was taking. Arguments arose over taxation, tariffs, internal improvements, the military, and slavery

=1846 - The Wilmot Proviso=

U. S. representative, David Wilmot (Pa.), introduced a bill in Congress that would keep slavery out of any territories that the United States gained in the Mexican- American War. The proviso (amendment) " neither slavery nor involuntary servitude shall ever exist". Southerners opposed this amendment because they said it was unconstitutional because it denied the states' rights to govern themselves. This amendment passed the House of Representatives, but was rejected by the Senate.

=1850 - The Compromise of 1850=

In 1849, California wanted to join the United States as a free state. The Compromise of 1850 was an attempt to reconcile the relations between the Northern and Southern states by keeping the balance of power between slave and free states. The compromise was offered by Henry Clay, who also was responsible for the Missouri Compromise. Zachary Taylor, an anti-slavery president would have vetoed the compromise but he died before the compromise reached his desk. After Taylor, Millard Fillmore became president and he was willing to negotiate with the Southern states.

Congress passed several laws that were part of The Compromise of 1850. California was admitted to the Union as a free state, with no restrictions on slavery in New Mexico, Utah and Texas. New territories could decide for themselves if they would be free or slave. The slave trade, but not slavery, was abolished and slavery was abolished in Washington, DC. The Fugitive Slave Act said that citizens and police officers must return runaway slaves to their owners. It was a federal crime to aid escaping slaves.

=1854 - Kansas- Nebraska Act=

Despite the Compromise of 1850, the North and the South continued to argue about slavery. The [|Kansas-Nebraska Act] overturned the Missouri Compromise and opened territory north of Missouri to slavery. This law proposed by Senator Stephen A. Douglas of Illinois gave settlers in new territories the right to decide for themselves whether or not to have slavery in their new territory. The issue of slavery would be decided by the citizens of the territory and not by Congress. This is called "Popular Sovereignty."

The North was unhappy about this law because they wanted unsettled western land for themselves and not southern slave owners. Abolitionists and slave states sent settlers into the territories to influence the future decision of the states to form as free or slave states. The tension between the North and the South led to [|violence in Congress]. South Carolina Senator Preston Brooks attacked Massachusetts Senator Charles Sumner with a cane on the floor of the Senate several days after Sumner publically denounced slavery, using language that offended many Southerners.

In 1857, the Supreme Court ruled that Congress could not keep out slavery in the territories. The Court said that slavery was supported by the Constitution and therefore could not be prohibited.



Bleeding Kansas
"Bleeding Kansas" was a term that referred to violence that was occurring in Kansas in the years immediately before the Civil War. The problems began after the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854. This law let citizens vote to see if slavery should be allowed in these two states. In order to convince Kansas citizens to vote for slavery, men from Missouri known as "Border Ruffians" came to Kansas and tried to subvert the elections by using violence and intimidation. Citizens who were Abolitionists (against slavery) were known as "Jay hawkers." There was much violence between the Border Ruffians and the Jay hawkers, which resulted in a civil war in the territory. Two major battles were the sacking of the town of Lawrence and the Massacre in 1855 at the Pottawatomie Creek in 1856. The anti-slavery faction eventually won with the help of abolitionist John Brown. If Kansas had voted for slavery, it would have been the only state above the boundary line that was established by the Missouri Compromise. Kansas became a state in the Union in 1861. This time of Kansas history is known as "Bloody Kansas" or "Bleeding Kansas" because more than 200 people die as a result of guerrilla warfare. An [|online exhibit] gives more information on this prelude to the Civil War.

In July 1854 an antislavery group formed the Republican Party. The Republican Party was opposed to the expansion of slavery into the Western territories. They favored a strong, central government and high tariffs to protect American manufacturers.

=1854 - 1859 John Brown=

John Brown was a fervent abolitionist who came to Kansas to help in the fight against slavery. He led the Free-Soil militia. The Free-soldiers opposed the expansion of slavery into the territories. Most of the settlers came to find fertile soil, but others moved to Kansas to oppose slavery. Both the South and the North were sending money and weapons to pro- and anti-slavery settlers. Soon Kansas had two governments, one pro-slavery and the other against slavery. On May 21, 1856, pro-slavery settlers invaded the town of Laurence, which was founded by anti-slavery citizens. There was much damage, including the destruction of two printing presses. Money was raised quickly to replace the destroyed presses and more anti-slavery settlers were called to go Kansas.

Two days after the attack at Laurence, John Brown and seven men, including his sons and son-in-law, invaded the pro-slavery town of Pottawatomie. They captured 5 men that they thought were supporting slavery and killed them. He was never arrested..

Brown was deeply religious and he was convinced that the only way to end slavery was to begin a slave rebellion in the South. He planned an attack on the federal arsenal at Harper's Ferry, hoping to seize guns that would be distributed to slaves to begin the rebellion. His plan was not successful and Brown was captured by Col. Robert E. Lee. Brown was charged with treason and hanged in 1859.

=1857 - Dred Scott Decision=

[|Dred Scott] was a slave. He was owned by Elizabeth Blow of Missouri. Elizabeth sold Dred Scott to an army surgeon, John Emerson, who took him to Illinois, where slavery was outlawed and to the Louisiana Territory, where slavery was outlawed by the Missouri Compromise. When Scott returned to Missouri, he sued for his freedom in the Missouri Courts in 1846. He claimed that since he had lived in free states, he was a free citizen. The Missouri court ruled against him, so he appealed the decision in federal court, all the way to the Supreme Court.

The Supreme Court dealt with three main questions:


 * Q: Could blacks, slaves, or free people be citizens?
 * A: Blacks are not citizens according to the Supreme Court decision
 * Q: What are Congresses rights to outlaw slavery in a territory?
 * A: Congress had no more right to outlaw slavery.
 * Q: Did Scott become free by living in Illinois?
 * A: This didn't make him free

The Supreme Court decision was 7-2. The court declared that it was unconstitutional for Congress to outlaw slavery in the United States territories. This was a very important decision.

=November 1860 - Presidential Election=

This race was one of the oddest and most widespread in our country's history. The Republicans fully supported [|Abraham Lincoln]. The Democrats were split between Stephen Douglas and John C. Breckenridge. The election became more confusing when a third Democratic candidate, John Bell, entered the race.

Lincoln won because the Democratic vote was split three ways. He won with only 40% of the votes, all of them from the North. In 10 Southern states, Lincoln was not even on the ballot. To white Southerners, this was not good. They feared Lincoln would abolish slavery, so they began talking of secession. Southerners saw Lincoln's election as proof that they had a weak influence over national politics.

=Secession=

Northerners viewed the secession of the Southern states as an act of rebellion against the United States. The Southern states were ready to fight and also willing to fight because they believed strongly in their right to self-govern. The Southern states called themselves The Confederate States of America. .

North Carolina
 * Dec. 20, 1860** - South Carolina was the first Southern state to secede
 * Jan. 9, 1861** - Mississippi
 * Jan. 10, 1861** - Florida
 * Jan. 11, 1861** - Alabama
 * Jan. 19, 1861** - Georgia
 * Jan. 26, 1861** - Louisiana
 * Feb. 1, 1861** - Texas
 * April 17, 1861** **-** Virginia
 * May 6, 1861** - **Arkansas**
 * May 20, 1861** -
 * June 8, 1861** - Tennessee


 * Border states:** Delaware, Maryland, Kentucky and Missouri. All of these border states remained in the Union, although they citizens fought for both the North and the South.

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