AP Notes, Outlines, Study Guides, Vocabulary, Practice Exams and more!

AMSCO AP US History Chapter 13 Flashcards

AMSCO United States History 2015 Edition, Chapter 13 The Union in Peril, 1848-1861

Terms : Hide Images
13441730232free-soil movementThis movement did not oppose slavery in the South, but they did not want the Western states to allow slavery. (p. 247)0
13441730260Free-Soil partyIn 1848, Northerns organized this party to advocate that the new Western states not allow slavery and provide free homesteads. Their slogan was, "free soil, free labor, free men". (p. 248)1
13441730233bleeding KansasAfter 1854, the conflicts between antislavery and proslavery forces exploded in the Kansas Territory. (p. 252)2
13441730234Pottawatomie CreekIn 1856 Kansas, abolitionist John Brown and his sons attacked this proslavery farm settlement and killed five settlers. (p. 253)3
13441730235Lecompton constitutionIn 1857, President James Buchanan asked that Congress accept this document and admit Kansas as a slave state. Congress did not accept it. (p. 255)4
13441730236popular sovereigntyAround 1850, this term referred to the idea that each new territory could determine by vote whether or not to allow slavery would be allowed in that region. (p. 248)5
13441730237Lewis CassThis Democratic senator from Michigan, proposed popular sovereignty as the solution to the slavery question in the territories. (p. 248)6
13441730261Henry ClayHe proposed the Compromise of 1850. (p. 249)7
13441730238Zachary TaylorThe twelfth president of the United States from 1849 to 1850. He was a general and hero in the Mexican War. He was elected to the presidency in 1848, representing the Whig party. He died suddenly in 1850 and Millard Fillmore became the president. (p 248, 249)8
13441730239Compromise of 1850Henry Clay proposed and it was signed into law by President Millard Fillmore. It proposed: * Admit California to the Union as a free state * Divide the remainder of the Mexican Cession into New Mexico and Utah (popular sovereignty) * Ban slave trade in D. C., but permit slaveholding * New Fugitive Slave Law to be enforced (p. 249)9
13441730240Stephen A. DouglasIn 1854, he devised the Kansas-Nebraska Act, which in effect overturned the Missouri Compromise, and allowed the South the opportunity to expand slavery. In 1858, he debated Abraham Lincoln in a famous series of seven debates in the campaign for the Illinois senate seat. He won the campaign for reelection to the Senate, but he alienated Southern Democrats. In 1860, he won the Democratic presidential nomination, but Southern Democrats nominated their own candidate, John Breckinridge. He was easily defeated by Abraham Lincoln in the presidential election that year. (p. 252, 256, 258)10
13441730241Millard FillmoreThe thirteenth president of the United States, serving from 1850 until 1853, and the last member of the Whig Party to hold that office. He was the second Vice President to become president upon the death of a sitting President, when he succeeded Zachary Taylor. As vice president he helped pass the Compromise of 1850. (p. 249, 255)11
13441730242Kansas-Nebraska ActThis 1854 act, sponsored by Senator Stephen A Douglas, would build a transcontinental railroad through the central United States. In order gain approval in the South, it would divide the Nebraska territory into Nebraska and Kansas and allow voting to decide whether to allow slavery. This increased regional tensions because it effectively repealed the Missouri Compromise, which had already determined that this area would not allow slavery. (p. 252)12
13441730243Crittenden compromiseIn the winter of 1860-1861, Senator John Crittenden proposed a constitutional amendment to appease the South. He proposed that slavery would be allowed in all areas south of the 36 30 line. The Republicans rejected the proposal because it would allow extension of slavery into the new territories. (p. 260)13
13441730244Franklin PierceThe fourteenth President of the United States from 1853 to 1857. A Democrat from New Hampshire, he was acceptable to Southern Democrats because he supported the Fugitive Slave Law. (p. 252)14
13441730245Know-Nothing partyThis political party started in the mid-1850s. Also known as the American party, they were mostly native-born Protestant Americans. Their core issue was opposition to Catholics and immigrants who were entering Northern cities in large numbers. (p. 254)15
13441730246Republican partyThis political party formed in 1854, in response to the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act. It was composed of a coalition of Free-Soilers, antislavery Whigs, and Democrats. Although not abolitionist, it sought to block the spread of slavery in the territories. (p. 254)16
13441730247John C. FremontIn the presidential election of 1856, this California senator was the Republican nominee. The Republican platform called for no expansion of slavery, free homesteads, and a probusiness protective tariff. He lost the election to James Buchanan, but won 11 of the 16 free states, which foreshadowed the emergence of a powerful Republican party. (p. 255)17
13441730248James BuchananThe fifteenth President of the United States from 1857 to 1861. He tried to maintain a balance between proslavery and antislavery factions, but his moderate views angered radicals in both North and South, and he was unable to forestall the secession of South Carolina to December 20, 1860. During his term: "Bleeding Kansas" (1856), Caning of Senator Sumner (1856), Lecompton Constitution (1857), Dred Scott case (1857) (p. 255)18
13441730249election of 1860In this presidential election, the Republican candidate, Abraham Lincoln won. Lincoln won all the northern states, while John C. Breckinridge, a South Democrat, won all the southern states. The South felt like it no longer had a voice in national politics and a number of states soon seceded from the Union. (p. 258)19
13441730262secessionThe election of Abraham Lincoln was the final event that caused the southern states to leave the Union. In December 1860, South Carolina voted unanimously to secede. Within the next six weeks Georgia, Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Texas had all seceded. In February 1861, representatives of seven states met in Montgomery, Alabama to create the Confederate States of America. (p. 259)20
13441730250Fugitive Slave LawCongress passed a second version of this law in 1850. The law's chief purpose was to track down runaway slaves who had escaped to a Northern state, capture them, and return them to their Southern owners. Enforcement of the law in the North was sometimes opposed even though there were penalties for hiding a runaway slave or obstructing enforcement of the law. (p. 250)21
13441730251Underground RailroadA network of people who helped thousands of enslaved people escape to the North by providing transportation and hiding places. (p. 250)22
13441730252Harriet TubmanBorn a slave, she escaped to the North and became the most renowned conductor on the Underground Railroad, leading more than 300 slaves to freedom. (p. 250)23
13441730253Dred Scott v. SandfordAn 1857 Supreme Court case, in which Chief Justice Roger Taney ruled that African Americans (free or slave), were not citizens of the United States, that Congress could not exclude slavery from any federal territory, and that the Missouri Compromise was unconstitutional. The ruling delighted Southern Democrats and infuriated Northern Republicans. (p. 255)24
13441730263Roger TaneyHe was a Southern Democrat and chief justice of the Supreme Court during the Dred Scott v. Sandford case. (p. 255)25
13441730264Abraham LincolnHe was elected president of the United States in 1860. He was a Republican, who ran on a platform that appealed to those in the North and the West. It called for the exclusion of slavery in the new territories, a protective tariff for industry, free land for homesteaders, and a railroad to the Pacific. (p. 258)26
13441730254Lincoln-Douglas debatesIn 1858, Stephen Douglas and Abraham Lincoln had seven debates in the campaign for the Illinois senate seat. Lincoln was not an abolitionist, but he attacked Douglas's seeming indifference to slavery as a moral issue. Although Lincoln lost the election to Douglas, he emerged as a national figure and leading contender for the Republican nomination for president. (p. 256)27
13441730255house-divided speechThe speech given by Abraham Lincoln when accepting the Republican nomination for the Illinois senate seat. He said, "This government cannot endure permanently half slave and half free". (p. 256)28
13441730256Freeport DoctrineDoctrine developed by Stephen Douglas that said slavery could not exist in a community if the local citizens did not pass laws (slave codes) maintaining it. This angered Southern Democrats. (p. 257)29
13441730257Sumner-Brooks incidentThis incident took place in 1856, when Congressman Preston Brooks severely beat Massachusetts Senator Charles Sumner. The attack occurred in the Senate chamber, after Sumner gave a vitriolic speech, "The Crime Against Kansas". (p. 254)30
13441730265John BrownHe led his four sons and some former slaves, in an attack on the federal arsenal, called the Harpers Ferry raid. (p. 257)31
13441730258Harpers Ferry raidIn October 1859, John Brown led his four sons and some former slaves, in an attack on the federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry. His impractical plan was to obtain guns to arm Virginia's slaves, whom he hoped would rise up in a general revolt. He and six of his followers were captured and hanged. Southern whites saw the raid as proof of the north's true intentions - to use slave revolts to destroy the South. (p. 257)32
13441730259Harriet Beecher Stowe, Uncle Tom's CabinIn 1852, she wrote this influential book about the conflict between a slave named Tom, and a brutal white slave owner, Simon Legree. It caused a generation of Northerners and many Europeans to regard all slave owners as cruel and inhuman. Southerners believed it to be proof of Northern prejudice against the Southern way of life. (p. 250)33

Need Help?

We hope your visit has been a productive one. If you're having any problems, or would like to give some feedback, we'd love to hear from you.

For general help, questions, and suggestions, try our dedicated support forums.

If you need to contact the Course-Notes.Org web experience team, please use our contact form.

Need Notes?

While we strive to provide the most comprehensive notes for as many high school textbooks as possible, there are certainly going to be some that we miss. Drop us a note and let us know which textbooks you need. Be sure to include which edition of the textbook you are using! If we see enough demand, we'll do whatever we can to get those notes up on the site for you!