Term
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Definition
| A moderate, who introduced the Kansas-Nebraska Act in 1854 and popularized the idea of popular sovereignty. |
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Term
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Definition
| The doctrine that stated that the people of a territory had the right to decide their own laws by voting. In the Kansas-Nebraska Act, popular sovereignty would decide whether a territory allowed slavery. |
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Term
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Definition
| According to the Missouri Compromise (1820), slavery was forbidden in the Louisiana territory north of the 36º30' N latitude. This was nullified by the Kansas-Nebraska Act. |
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Term
| Election of 1856: Republican Party, Know-Nothing Party |
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Definition
| Democrat - James Buchanan (won by a narrow margin). Republican - John Fremont. Know- Nothing Party and Whig - Millard Fillmore. First election for the Republican Party. Know- Nothings opposed immigration and Catholic influence. They answered questions from outsiders about the party by saying "I know nothing". |
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Term
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Definition
| Also known as the Kansas Border War. Following the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act, pro-slavery forces from Missouri, known as the Border Ruffians, crossed the border into Kansas and terrorized and murdered antislavery settlers. Antislavery sympathizers from Kansas carried out reprisal attacks, the most notorious of which was John Brown's 1856 attack on the settlement at Pottawatomie Creek. The war continued for four years before the antislavery forces won. The violence it generated helped percipitate the Civil War. |
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Term
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Definition
| Where the pro-slavery /anti-slavery war in Kansas began ("Bleeding Kansas or Kansas Border War). |
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Term
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Definition
| During the Kansas border war, the New England Emigrant Aid Society sent rifles at the instigation of fervid abolitionists like the preacher Henry Beecher. These rifles became known as "Beecher's Bibles". |
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Term
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Definition
| In 1859, the militant abolitionist John Brown seized the U.S. arsenal at Harper's Ferry. He planned to end slavery by massacring slave owners and freeing their slaves. He was captured and executed. |
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Term
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Definition
| John Brown let a part of six in Kansas that killed 5 pro-slavery men. This helped make the Kansas border war a national issue. |
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Term
| New England Emigrant Aid Company |
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Definition
| Promoted anti-slavery migration to Kansas. The movement encouraged 2600 people to move. |
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Term
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Definition
| 1856 - Charles Sumner gave a two day speech on the Senate floor. He denounced the South for crimes against Kansas and singled out Senator Andrew Brooks of South Carolina for extra abuse. Brooks beat Sumner over the head with his cane, severely crippling him. Sumner was the first Republican martyr. |
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Term
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Definition
| The pro-slavery constitution suggested for Kansas' admission to the union. It was rejected. |
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Term
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Definition
| A Missouri slave sued for his freedom, claiming that his four year stay in the northern portion of the Louisiana Territory made free land by the Missouri Compromise had made him a free man. The U.S, Supreme Court decided he couldn't sue in federal court because he was property, not a citizen. |
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Term
| Chief Justice Roger B. Taney (pronounced "Tawny") |
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Definition
| As chief justice, he wrote the important decision in the Dred Scott case, upholding police power of states and asserting the principle of social responsibility of private property. He was Southern and upheld the fugitive slave laws. |
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Term
| Lincoln-Douglas debates of 1858 during Illinois Senatorial campaign |
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Definition
| A series of seven debates. The two argued the important issues of the day like popular sovereignty, the Lecompton Constitution and the Dred Scott decision. Douglas won these debates, but Lincoln's position in these debates helped him beat Douglas in the 1860 presidential election. |
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Term
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Definition
| During the Lincoln-Douglas debates, Douglas said in his Freeport Doctrine that Congress couldn't force a territory to become a slave state against its will. |
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Term
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Definition
| Began with the failure of the Ohio Life Insurance Company and spread to the urban east. The depression affected the industrial east and the wheat belt more than the South. |
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Term
| George Fitzhugh, Sociology for the South, or the Failure of Free Society |
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Definition
| The most influential propagandist in the decade before the Civil War. In his Sociology (1854), he said that the capitalism of the North was a failure. In another writing he argued that slavery was justified when compared to the cannibalistic approach of capitalism. Tried to justify slavery. |
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Term
| Hinton Helper, The Impending Crisis of the South |
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Definition
| Hinton Helper of North Carolina spoke for poor, non-slave-owing Whites in his 1857 book, which as a violent attack on slavery. It wasn't written with sympathy for Blacks, who Helper despised, but with a belief that the economic system of the South was bringing ruin on the small farmer. |
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Term
| Lincoln's "House Divided" speech |
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Definition
| In his acceptance speech for his nomination to the Senate in June, 1858, Lincoln paraphrased from the Bible: "A house divided against itself cannot stand." He continued, "I do not believe this government can continue half slave and half free, I do not expect the Union to be dissolved - I do not expect the house to fall - but I do believe it will cease to be divided." |
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Term
| John Brown, Harper's Ferry Raid |
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Definition
| In 1859, the militant abolitionist John Brown seized the U.S. arsenal at Harper's Ferry. He planned to end slavery by massacring slave owners and freeing their slaves. He was captured and executed. |
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Term
| Election of 1860: candidates, parties, issues |
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Definition
| Republican - Abraham Lincoln. Democrat - Stephan A. Douglas, John C. Breckenridge. Constitutional Union - John Bell. Issues were slavery in the territories (Lincoln opposed adding any new slave states). |
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Term
| Democratic Party Conventions: Baltimore, Charleston |
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Definition
| The Democratic Party split North and South. The Northern Democratic convention was held in Baltimore and the Southern in Charleston. Douglas was the Northern candidate and Breckenridge was the Southern (they disagreed on slavery). |
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Term
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Definition
| He was a moderate and wanted the union to stay together. After Southern states seceded from the Union, he urged the middle states to join the North. |
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Term
| John Breckinridge (1821-1875) |
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Definition
| Nominated by pro-slavers who had seceded from the Democratic convention, he was strongly for slavery and states' rights. |
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Term
| Republican Party: 1860 platform, supporter, leaders |
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Definition
| 1860 platform: free soil principles, a protective tariff. Supporters: anti-slavers, business, agriculture. Leaders: William M. Seward, Carl Shulz. |
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Term
| Buchanan and the Secession Crisis |
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Definition
| After Lincoln was elected, but before he was inaugurated, seven Southern states seceded. Buchanan, the lame duck president, decided to leave the problem for Lincoln to take care of. |
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Term
| Crittenden Compromise proposal |
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Definition
| A desperate measure to prevent the Civil War, introduced by John Crittenden, Senator from Kentucky, in December 1860. The bill offered a Constitutional amendment recognizing slavery in the territories south of the 36º30' line, noninterference by Congress with existing slavery, and compensation to the owners of fugitive slaves. Republicans, on the advice of Lincoln, defeated it. |
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Term
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Definition
| States bordering the North: Delaware, Maryland, Kentucky and Missouri. They were slave states, but did not secede. |
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Term
| South's advantages in the Civil War |
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Definition
| Large land areas with long coasts, could afford to lose battles, and could export cotton for money. They were fighting a defensive war and only needed to keep the North out of their states to win. Also had the nation's best military leaders, and most of the existing military equipment and supplies. |
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Term
| North's advantages in the Civil War |
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Definition
| Larger numbers of troops, superior navy, better transportation, overwhelming financial and industrial reserves to create munitions and supplies, which eventually outstripped the South's initial material advantage. |
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Term
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Definition
| Site of the opening engagement of the Civil War. On December 20, 1860, South Carolina had seceded from the Union, and had demanded that all federal property in the state be surrendered to state authorities. Major Robert Anderson concentrated his units at Fort Sumter, and, when Lincoln took office on March 4, 1861, Sumter was one of only two forts in the South still under Union control. Learning that Lincoln planned to send supplies to reinforce the fort, on April 11, 1861, Confederate General Beauregard demanded Anderson's surrender, which was refused. On April 12, 1861, the Confederate Army began bombarding the fort, which surrendered on April 14, 1861. Congress declared war on the Confederacy the next day. |
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Term
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Definition
| At Bull Run, a creek, Confederate soldiers charged Union men who were en route to besiege Richmond. Union troops fled back to Washington. Confederates didn't realize their victory in time to follow up on it. First major battle of the Civil War - both sides were ill-prepared. |
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Term
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Definition
| First engagement ever between two iron-clad naval vessels. The two ships battled in a portion of the Cheasepeake Bay known as Hampton Roads for five hours on March 9, 1862, ending in a draw. Monitor - Union. Merrimac - Confederacy. Historians use the name of the original ship Merrimac on whose hull the Southern ironclad was constructed, even though the official Confederate name for their ship was the CSS Virginia. |
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Term
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Definition
| General Robert E. Lee and General Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson were major leaders and generals for the Confederacy. Best military leaders in the Civil War. |
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Term
| Grant, McClellan, Sherman and Meade |
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Definition
| Union generals in the Civil War. |
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Term
| Vicksburg, Gettysburg, Antietam, Appomattox |
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Definition
| Battle sites of the Civil War. Gettysburg - 90,000 soldiers under Meade vs. 76,000 under Lee, lasted three days and the North won. Vicksburg - besieged by Grant and surrendered after six months. Antietam - turning point of the war and a much-needed victory for Lincoln. Appomattox - Lee surrendered to Grant. |
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Term
| Jefferson Davis, Alexander Stephens |
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Definition
| Davis was chosen as president of the Confederacy in 1861. Stephens was vice-president. |
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Term
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Definition
| Starting in 1862, the North began to blockade the Southern coast in an attempt to force the South to surrender. The Southern coast was so long that it could not be completely blockaded. |
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Term
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Definition
| Cotton was a cash crop and could be sold for large amounts of money. Wheat was mainly raised to feed farmers and their animals. The North had to choose which to grow. |
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Term
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Definition
| Lincoln believed that anti-war Northern Democrats harbored traitorous ideas and he labeled them "Copperheads", poisonous snakes waiting to get him. |
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Term
| Congressman Clement L. Vallandigham |
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Definition
| An anti-war Democrat who criticized Lincoln as a dictator, called him "King Abraham". He was arrested and exiled to the South. |
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Term
| Suspension of habeas corpus |
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Definition
| Lincoln suspended this writ, which states that a person cannot be arrested without probable cause and must be informed of the charges against him and be given an opportunity to challenge them. Throughout the war, thousands were arrested for disloyal acts. Although the U.S. Supreme Court eventually held the suspension edict to be unconstitutional, by the time the Court acted the Civil War was nearly over. |
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Term
| Republican legislation passed in Congress after Southerners left: banking, tariff, homestead, transcontinental railroad |
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Definition
| With no Southerners to vote them down, the Northern Congressman passed all the bills they wanted to. Led to the industrial revolution in America. |
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Term
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Definition
| The poor were drafted disproportionately, and in New York in 1863, they rioted, killing at least 73 people. |
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Term
| Emancipation Proclamation |
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Definition
| September 22, 1862 - Lincoln freed all slaves in the states that had seceded, after the Northern victory at the Battle of Antietam. Lincoln had no power to enforce the law. |
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Term
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Definition
| Minister to Great Britain during the Civil War, he wanted to keep Britain from entering the war on the side of the South. |
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Term
| Great Britain: Trent, Alabama, Laird rams, "Continuous Voyage" |
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Definition
| Union frigate stopped the Trent, a British steamer and abducted two Confederate ambassadors aboard it. The Alabama was a British-made vessel and fought for the Confederacy, destroying over 60 Northern ships in 22 months. The Laird rams were ships specifically designed to break blockades; the English prevented them from being sold to the South. |
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Term
| Election of 1864: candidates, parties |
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Definition
| Lincoln ran against Democrat General McClellan. Lincoln won 212 electoral votes to 21, but the popular vote was much closer. (Lincoln had fired McClellan from his position in the war.) |
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Term
| Financing of the war effort by North and South |
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Definition
| The North was much richer than the South, and financed the war through loans, treasury notes, taxes and duties on imported goods. The South had financial problems because they printed their Confederate notes without backing them with gold or silver. |
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Term
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Definition
| Launched the American Red Cross in 1881. An "angel" in the Civil War, she treated the wounded in the field. |
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Term
| Lincoln's Ten Percent Plan |
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Definition
| Former Confederate states would be readmitted to the Union if 10% of their citizens took a loyalty oath and the state agreed to ratify the 13th Amendment which outlawed slavery. Not put into effect because Lincoln was assassinated. |
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Term
| Assassination of April 14, 1865 |
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Definition
| While sitting in his box at Ford's Theatre watching "Our American Cousin", President Lincoln was shot by John Wilkes Booth. |
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Term
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Definition
| An actor, planned with others for six months to abduct Lincoln at the start of the war, but they were foiled when Lincoln didn't arrive at the scheduled place. April 14, 1865, he shot Lincoln at Ford's Theatre and cried, "Sic Semper Tyrannis!" ("Thus always to tyrants!") When he jumped down onto the stage his spur caught in the American flag draped over the balcony and he fell and broke his leg. He escaped on a waiting horse and fled town. He was found several days later in a barn. He refused to come out; the barn was set on fire. Booth was shot, either by himself or a soldier. |
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Term
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Definition
| Supreme Court ruled that military trials of civilians were illegal unless the civil courts are inoperative or the region is under marshall law. |
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Term
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Definition
| After the Civil War, a group that believed the South should be harshly punished and thought that Lincoln was sometimes too compassionate towards the South. |
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Term
Wade-Davis Bill, veto, Wade-Davis Manifesto
1864 |
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Definition
| Bill declared that the Reconstruction of the South was a legislative, not executive, matter. It was an attempt to weaken the power of the president. Lincoln vetoed it. Wade-Davis Manifesto said Lincoln was acting like a dictator by vetoing. |
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Term
| Joint Committee on Reconstruction (Committee of Fifteen) |
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Definition
| Six senators and nine representatives drafted the 14th Amendment and Reconstruction Acts. The purpose of the committee was to set the pace of Reconstruction. Most were radical Republicans |
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Term
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Definition
| 1867 - Pushed through congress over Johnson's veto, it gave radical Republicans complete military control over the South and divided the South into five military zones, each headed by a general with absolute power over his district. |
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Term
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Definition
| The Southern states had relinquished their rights when they seceded. This, in effect, was suicide. This theory was used to justify the North taking military control of the South. |
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Term
| Conquered territory theory |
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Definition
| Stated that conquered Southern states weren't part of the Union, but were instead conquered territory, which the North could deal with however they like. |
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Term
| The unreconstructed South |
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Definition
| The South's infrastructure had been destroyed - manufacturing had almost ceased. Few banks were solvent and in some areas starvation was imminent. General Sherman had virtually destroyed large areas on his "march to the sea". |
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Term
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Definition
| Restrictions on the freedom of former slaves, passed by Southern governments. |
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Term
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Definition
| Argued that Texas had never seceded because there is no provision in the Constitution for a state to secede, thus Texas should still be a state and not have to undergo reconstruction. |
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Term
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Definition
| radical Republican who believed in harsh punishments for the South. Leader of the radical Republicans in Congress. |
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Term
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Definition
| The same Senator who had been caned by Brooks in 1856, sumner returned to the Senate after the outbreak of the Civil War. He was the formulator of the state suicide theory, and supporter of emancipation. He was an outspoken radical Republican involved in the impeachment of Andrew Johnson. |
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Term
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Definition
| 1865 - Agency set up to aid former slaves in adjusting themselves to freedom. It furnished food and clothing to needy blacks and helped them get jobs. |
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Term
| Andrew Johnson (1808-1875) |
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Definition
| A Southerner form Tennessee, as V.P. when Lincoln was killed, he became president. He opposed radical Republicans who passed Reconstruction Acts over his veto. The first U.S. president to be impeached, he survived the Senate removal by only one vote. He was a very weak president. |
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Term
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Definition
| Service as director of the Freedmen's Bureau. |
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Term
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Definition
| White-supremacist group formed by six former Conferedate officers after the Civil War. Name is essentially Greek for "Circle of Friends". Group eventually turned to terrorist attacks on blacks. The original Klan was disbanded in 1869, but was later resurrected by white supremacists in 1915. |
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Term
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Definition
| Prohibited abridgement of rights of blacks or any other citizens. |
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Term
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Definition
| Freed all slaves, abolished slavery. |
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Term
| Fourteenth Amendment and its provisions |
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Definition
| 1866, ratified 1868. It fixed provision of the Civil Rights Bill: full citizenship to all native-born or naturalized Americans, including former slaves and immigrants. |
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Term
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Definition
| Ratified 1870 - No one could be denied the right to vote on account of race, color or having been a slave. It was to prevent states from amending their constitutions to deny black suffrage. |
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Term
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Definition
| Enacted by radical Congress, it forbade the president from removing civil officers without consent of the Senate. It was meant to prevent Johnson from removing radicals from office. Johnson broke this law when he fired a radical Republican from his cabinet, and he was impeached for this "crime". |
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Term
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Definition
| To bring charges against a public official. Johnson was impeached, but was saved from being taken out of office by one vote. |
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Term
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Definition
| Chief Justice in 1868, he upheld Republican Reconstruction laws and ruled that paper money was not a legal substitute for specie. |
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Term
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Definition
| Secretary of War, Edwin M. Stanton acted as a spy for the radicals in cabinet meetings. President Johnson asked him to resign in 1867. The dismissal of Stanton let to the impeachment of Johnson because Johnson had broken the Tenure of Office Law. |
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Term
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Definition
| derogatory term for Southerners who were working with the North to buy up land from desperate Southerners. |
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Term
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Definition
| derogatory term applied to Northerners who migrated south during the Reconstruction to take advantage of opportunities to advance their own fortunes by buying up land from desperate Southerners and by manipulating new black voters to obtain lucrative government contracts. |
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Term
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Definition
| In December, 1866, the U.S. offered to take Alaska from Russia. Russia was eager to give it up, as the fur resources had been exhausted, and, expecting friction with Great Britain, they preferred to see defenseless Alaska in U.S. hands. Called "Seward's Folly" and "Seward's Icebox", the purchase was made in 1867 for $7,200,000 and gave the U.S. Alaska's resources of fish, timber, oil and gold. |
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Term
| Secretary of State William Seward |
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Definition
| 1867 - An eager expansionist, he was the energetic supporter of the Alaskan purchase and negotiator of the deal often called "Seward's Folly" because Alaska was not fit for settlement or farming. |
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Term
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Definition
| Nephew of Napoleon Bonaparte, and elected emperor of France from 1852-1870, he invaded Mexico when the Mexican government couldn't repay loans from French bankers. He sent in an army and set up a new government under Maximillian. He refused Lincoln's request that France withdraw. After the Civil War, the U.S. sent an army to enforce the request and Napoleon withdrew. |
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Term
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Definition
| European prince appointed by Napoleon III of France to lead the new government set up in Mexico. After the Civil War, the U.S. invaded and he was executed, a demonstration of the enforcement of the Monroe Doctrine to European powers. |
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Term
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Definition
| 1823 - Declared that Europe should not interfere in the affairs of the Western Hemisphere and that any attempt at interference by a European power would be seen as a threat to the U.S. It also declared that a New World colony which has gained independence may not be recolonized by Europe. (It was written at a time when many South American nations were gaining independence). Only England, in particular George Canning, supported the Monroe Doctrine. Mostly just a show of nationalism, the doctrine had no major impact until later in the 1800s. |
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Term
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Definition
| U.S. president 1873-1877. Military hero of the Civil War, he led a corrupt administration, consisting of friends and relatives. Although Grant was personally a very honest and moral man, his administration was considered the most corrupt the U.S. had had at that time. |
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Term
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Definition
| 871 - Settled the Northern claims between the U.S. and Great Britain. Canada gave the U.S. permanent fishing rights to the St. Lawrence River |
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Term
| Secretary of State Hamilton Fish |
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Definition
| member of the Grant administration, he was an able diplomat who peacefully settled conflicts with Great Britain through the Treaty of Washington. |
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Term
| Election of 1872: Liberal Republicans, Horace Greeley |
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Definition
| Liberal Republicans sought honest government and nominated Greeley as their candidate. The Democratic Party had also chosen Greeley. Regular Republicans renominated Grant. The Republicans controlled enough Black votes to gain victory for Grant. |
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Term
| Election of 1876: Hayes and Tilden |
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Definition
| Rutherford B. Hayes - liberal Republican, Civil War general, he received only 165 electoral votes. Samuel J. Tilden - Democrat, received 264,000 more popular votes that Hayes, and 184 of the 185 electoral votes needed to win. 20 electoral votes were disputed, and an electoral commission decided that Hayes was the winner - fraud was suspected. |
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Term
| Compromise of 1877 provisions |
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Definition
| Hayes promised to show concern for Southern interests and end Reconstruction in exchange for the Democrats accepting the fraudulent election results. He took Union troops out of the South. |
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Term
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Definition
| Term applied to the one-party (Democrat) system of the South following the Civil War. For 100 years after the Civil War, the South voted Democrat in every presidential election. |
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Term
| Sharecropping, Crop Lien System |
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Definition
| Sharecropping provided the necessities for Black farmers. Storekeepers granted credit until the farm was harvested. To protect the creditor, the storekeeper took a mortgage, or lien, on the tenant's share of the crop. The system was abused and uneducated blacks were taken advantage of. The results, for Blacks, was not unlike slavery. |
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Term
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Definition
| The separation of blacks and whites, mostly in the South, in public facilities, transportation, schools, etc. |
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Term
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Definition
| North Carolina free black, he became a senator in 1870. |
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Term
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Definition
| Became a senator in 1874 -- the only black to be elected to a full term until Edward Brooke in 1966. |
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Term
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Definition
| Mississippi wanted the president to stop enforcing the Reconstruction Acts because they were unconstitutional. The Supreme Court decided that the Acts were constitutional and the states must obey them. |
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