THE DEBATE OVER SLAVERY

Section 1Chapter 15

Focus Questions How did the outcome of the Mexican War

affect the debate over the expansion of slavery?

What were the major provisions of the Compromise of 1850, and what reasons were given for supporting or opposing it?

Why was the Fugitive Slave Act controversial in the North?

The Expansion of Slavery The victory in the Mexican War added

new land to the United States and brought back the debate over slavery

The Missouri Compromise had divided the country into free and slave states

Polk wanted the line to extend into new territory just taken from Mexico

The Expansion of Slavery The debate over slavery

really began to show the sectionalism (favoring interests of a region over the good of the country) of the country

Senator Lewis Cass called for popular sovereignty, which stated that the people of the state would determine if they would choose slavery

The Expansion of Slavery In 1848, the Free-

Soil Party was formed and it did not side with Democrats or Whigs

Whig candidate Zachary Taylor won the 1848 election

The Expansion of Slavery When California went

through the gold rush it skipped the territorial process for becoming a state

Many in California wanted to enter the Union as a free state but Southern politicians did not want California to enter as a free state as it would through the balance of power to free states in Congress

The Compromise of 1850 Henry Clay was known as the “Great

Compromiser” and stepped forward with a new plan to end the debate: Let California enter as a free state Popular sovereignty would decide slavery in the

Mexican cession territories Texas give up its claims east of the upper Rio

Grande River and the federal government will pay of Texas’s debt

End the slave trade in Washington D.C. (slavery still allowed just no new trading)

New more efficient fugitive slave law

The Compromise of 1850 Clay’s plan had

critics in the South and in the North

Some felt it was too weak on the slave trade while others in the south thought it was too strict

The Compromise of 1850 Daniel Webster of

Massachusetts was a supporter of the plan because preservation of the Union is more important then stopping the expansion of slavery He criticized northerners

who against it and scolded southerners who wanted to break away

The Compromise of 1850 was passed in September and accomplished most of what Clay wanted

The Fugitive Slave Act The Fugitive Slave Act made it a

federal crime to help runaway slaves It allowed officials to arrest slaves in

areas where slavery was illegal Anyone who helped a runaway slave

faced six months in jail and a $1000 fine Thousands of African Americans went to

Canada to escape potential prosecution

The Fugitive Slave Act For the most part

Northerners who resisted the Fugitive Slave Act did so without violence

Anthony Burns was a fugitive that was caught in Boston and a group of abolitionists went to break him out

Along the way a deputy marshal was killed

Antislavery Literature Frederick Douglass and Sojourner Truth

put together narratives that were very popular

Truth’s narratives were centered around a woman and took place while she was a slave in New York

Antislavery Literature Uncle Tom’s Cabin was

the most powerful piece of literature that was written for abolitionists

Harriet Beecher Stowe wrote this book and it centered on a slave named Tom who was separated from his family

She had learned about slaver when her family moved to Ohio and she met fugitive slaves there

Focus Questions How did the outcome of the Mexican War

affect the debate over the expansion of slavery?

What were the major provisions of the Compromise of 1850, and what reasons were given for supporting or opposing it?

Why was the Fugitive Slave Act controversial in the North?