The Politics of Slavery
The beginnings of the political discussion on slavery
The beginnings of the political discussion on slavery. . . but this momentous question, like a fire bell in the night, awakened and filled me with terror. I considered it at once as the knell of the Union. it is hushed indeed for the moment. but this is a reprieve only, not a final sentence. a geographical line, coinciding with a marked principle, moral and political, once conceived and held up to the angry passions of men, will never be obliterated; and every new irritation will mark it deeper and deeper. -Thomas Jefferson
• Gag rules • Reaction to slave rebellions/Nat Turner • States’ Rights philosophy • Didn’t bring in Texas
Early Anti-Slavery efforts in politics: JQ Adams: Petitioning Congress William Lloyd Garrison: rejecting politics for abolitionism
Post Jackson Politics 1840 election William Henry Harrison: John Tyler: Whig or…. Turns Democrat Dies after one month Virginia planter, pro-state’s rights, supporter of Texas annexation and slavery
Post Jackson Politics Tyler’s Presidency It’s all about Texas! John Tyler: Whig or…. Turns Democrat Dems want it to expand slavery after LP closed in 1820 No one wants him! Whigs cautious about expansion and volatility of slavery debate Whigs and MVB block Texas annexation in 1844!
Whigs picked Henry Clay to run again Anti-Slavery MVB sought Dems. nomination, didn’t get 2/3’s nomination, Polk selected as dark horse No magic for the Great Compromiser: Birney took votes away from free soil Whigs in NY, southern Whigs defect As a result: James K. Polk (D) was elected Texas annexation announced by Tyler, passed on 1 st day of Polk’s presidency
Polk: Mr. Manifest Destiny • A Slavocracy? • Polk: Tennessee slaveholder, bought more during his presidency. • Added Oregon to America • Mr. Polk’s War: Mexican-American War led to Mexican Cession and annexation of Texas. • Rejected Wilmot Proviso, advocated extending Mizzou Comp line to Pacific • Wanted Gadsden Purchase and purchase of Cuba • Gave MD his all…. grew sick and died 9 months after his one term presidency!
Treaty of GH and $18 million gave the U. S. the Mexican Cession.
Free Soil Ideology Starts with David Wilmot’s “Proviso”, connected to Polk’s $2 million request for bribe to Mexico, based on NW Ordinance David Wilmot: “I would preserve for white free labor a fair country…. Where the sons of toil, of my own race and color, can live without the disgrace which association with negro slavery brings upon free labor” Free Labor supporters claimed that the south was stagnating, rejecting values of progress and individualism and threatening democracy “Free Soil, Free Speech, Free Labor, Free Men” Free Soil-ites advocated not for abolitionism necessarily, but a limit on spread of slavery: See Abe’s arguments in LD Debates Ideology split Whigs: N. Dems, anti-slavery Whigs, Liberty Party created the Free Soil Party and helped eventually form the Republican Party
What to do with the territories? Tough Question: what was “Constitutional” in deciding whether slavery belonged in the new lands? Did Congress have the power to get rid of or limit slavery? Free Soil? Popular (or squatter) Sovereignty? Slavery as property to be taken anywhere? Extend the 36 30 line?
Most of Mexican Cession below Missouri Comp. line Gadsden Purch. made to make southern transcont. RR route-strengthening southern economy
Election of 1848 Zachary Taylor (W), war hero, no political experience Martin Van Buren runs for the Free Soil Party, supporting limit on spread of slavery Lewis Cass (D), proslavery advocate
-Mexican Cession and California statehood threatens Union, southerners threaten secession. -Politics dominated by Clay, Webster, and Calhoun one more time: What to do? -Taylor threatens veto of the Compromise Bill but…. dies after he ate milk, cherries and pickles at a 4 th of July picnic celebrating the start of the Wash. Monument! Official cause: bilious diarrhoea Exhumed in 1991 to see if poisoned…. Final analysis: doctors “drugged him with ipecac, calomel, opium and quinine (at 40 grains a whack), and bled and blistered him too”
Stephen Douglas separates the Bill into 5 Bills, Millard Fillmore becomes president, supports Compromise • Clay becomes exhausted, leaves DC and dies two years later. • Calhoun too sick to speak, writes argument against…. and dies! Compromise passes as five separate bills: 1. California admitted as free state 2. Slave trade abolished in D. C. 3. Utah and New Mexico admitted with pop sov 4. Fugitive Slave Law passed 5. Texas gave up land to NM and Arizona
1852 Election: Calm before the Storm Democrat candidate: Franklin Pierce from NH Whigs dump Fillmore, nominate Gen. Winfield Scott runs as anti-slavery Whig, loses pro-slavery Whig support, splits party and loses election President Franklin Pierce: -Doughface: Northerner with southern sympathies and worst prez ever? -Added Gadsden Purchase (who can’t laugh at the Gadsden Purchase? ) -Young America movement: Supported Ostend Manifesto: seize Cuba was he 50 years too early? -Kansas/Nebraska Act, Bloody Kansas sinks his presidency
“Young America”, expansion of slavery, the new “Manifest Destiny”
Kansas Nebraska Act 1854 1. Stephen Douglas promotes northern route for transcont RR 2. Southerners accept popular sov. for both Nebraska and Kansas 3. Nebraska goes for free soil The Storm arrives! Northern Whigs, Free-Soilers and Northern Democrats hate the K/N Act. It destroys the sacred Missouri Compromise!
Bleeding Kansas implodes into violence as Missouri ruffians and pro slavery-ites invade Republican Party is born-Northern Whigs and Dems and Free-Soilers Sacking of free-town Lawrence, KS May 22, 1856 Border ruffians from Missouri
1856
May 22, 1856: The caning of Charles Sumner by Preston Brooks: -Sumner had attacked the Fugitive Slave Law, Stephen Douglas, Comp of 1850 and Brook’s uncle Andrew Butler from SC as a “pimp” to slavery’s harlot
May 24, 1856: John Brown is enraged by caning, attacks and hacks to death pro-slavery supporters in Kansas at Pottawatomie Creek
Formation of the Republican Party: Impetus: passing of the Kansas/Nebraska Act Who Joined? Free Soil-ers “Conscience” Whigs Northern Democrats mad at KN Act Yankees, N. Protestants Reformers Beliefs: • “Free Soil, Free Labor, Free Men” • Economic Development: Banks and RR’s • Social Reform • Anti-immigrant, Catholic
1856: James Buchanan defeats John C. Fremont, Millard Fillmore helps as Know. Nothing candidate draining Republican votes from Fremont Buchanan: utterly helpless as president, promises in inaugural to not run again: Help!: Dred Scott Case, Lecompton Constitution, Panic of 1857, Harper’s Ferry all blow up his presidency
Dred Scott: May 1857, the worst case in Supreme Court history? -SCCJ Taney, former slaveholder, rules: -Scott has no rights as a citizen -Fed govt had no right to enact Comp of 1820 therefore slavery is legal everywhere! Fall of 1858: Lincoln-Douglas Debates in Illinois Nation is captured by Illinois senate race and discussion about slavery
The Lincoln-Douglas (U. S. Senate) Debates, 1858 A House divided against itself, cannot stand.
John Brown’s raid on Harper’s Ferry: a direct attack on the south in 1859 Murderer or Martyr?
Election of 1860 Free Soil vs Popular Sovereignty Stephen Douglas (D) 5’ 4’’ Abraham Lincoln (R) 6’ 4’’
Election of 1860
December 20, 1860: South Carolina secedes from the Union
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