In the late nineteenth century, the North and the South were sharply divided in terms of lifestyle, economical strengths and weaknesses, morals, and political viewpoints. There were many issues that were heatedly debated at the time; slavery, education, industrial expansion, and the rights of freed African Americans. The economy varied hugely depending on the region. In the North, factories fed the economy, and it was full of booming cities. The South however was dependent on "King Cotton," a crop which was almost entirely dependent on slave labor. Because of the two contrasting economies and lifestyles, abolition was a hot mess to debate. While many Southerners agreed that the notion of slavery was a wrong one, they were unwilling to give up the empire they had built on the backs of their slaves. This meant that congress had its hands full trying to appease the two sides- the one, …show more content…
Republicans from the North such as Abraham Lincoln were against the spread of slavery, and so Sen. Stephen Douglas made a symbolic move against the North, the territories which would have been unlikely candidates for slave-holding states were stormed by slaveholders from Missouri, and brief fighting broke out in Kansas. The North was struck again with the effect of the Dred Scott v. Stanford case, which ruled that slavery could not be banned in the United States. This was a setback to anti-slavery Northerners, who though fighting to keep slavery out of their states, were told that slavery must be allowed universally. Dred Scott v. Stanford ensured that the Northerners felt their values were being attacked, and began to rise defensively as they began to sense compromise would not work in their
One group wanted slavery to be abolished and the opposing group wanted slavery to expand into new territories. Ultimately, it was decided that Congress would have no authority over slavery, and that slavery would not be brought
While the South's economy relied on cotton and the Cotton Gin, the North had other plans to gain control once again. The North, an extremely anti-slavery section of America was
Eli Whitney was born on December 8,1765 in Westboro, Massachusetts. Ever since he was a young child, Eli had a knack with making objects with his hands. When Eli was a teenager he made a small shop on his dad's farm where he built nails and other essentials that people could not really find in the States. In May 1789, when Eli was twenty-four he entered Yale College. From his classmates view he was middle-aged and old.
Dred Scott was a slave who sued his owner. He claimed he was free because his previous owner had taken him to Illinois (a free state) where he argued before the court that Congress had banned slavery by the Missouri Compromise of 1820. The state of Missouri ended up finding Scott was going to be a slave, even though the previous decisions by Missouri favored the Emancipation Proclamation because slavery has become very popular within expansion issues and compromise issues. The Dred Scott v. Sanford case is an early example of the Court’s involvement in race relations, new attitudes arise that would be changed by the Civil War, and the civil rights movement. Abolitionists were livid.
During the early-to-mid 1800s, the North and South had begun to seriously argue on the issue of slavery. While the South were in favor of keeping slavery, the North could not wait to be rid of it. The decision of the Dred Scott case would be known as an important event which would spark the friction between the North and South to rise drastically. Dred Scott, an African American slave, sued for his freedom because he had lived in a free state for most of his time in the United States. In the ruling at Supreme Court, Chief Justice Taney had ruled that because he was an African American slave, Dred Scott could not sue for the reason that Scott was not a citizen and that he was property.
Throughout the war, the North and the South’s viewpoints had been continuously changing. Their opinions were both similar and different throughout the war. Both sides initially believed they would win the war, swiftly and easily. Both also realized that their thought was wrong. The North carried the idea that they were morally just and correct.
The Southerners ardently supported slavery as it was an economic asset for their plantations. The Northerners, influenced by the abolitionist movement, strongly opposed the idea of slavery, stating that it was morally wrong. Like most Americans of the time, the judges themselves held strong opinions about slavery which
In the early 19th century, the United States was relatively calm towards slavery as compared to the mid-1800’s. During this stage, agreements, such as the Missouri Compromise, satisfied both the northern and southern US and kept them at peace, but only for a brief period of time. As the years passed by, the belief in abolitionism grew, mainly in the North, as figures like William Lloyd Garrison increased the popularity of the movement. The South only felt anger towards the rise of the abolition movement and hence, conflict between the two sides developed over the next few decades, which eventually climaxed with the Civil War. Although the North and the South were able to compromise in the early 1800’s, the tension and violence caused by the
Those is the south wanted to keep slavery as a way of making their money. The north primarily just wanted slavery gone. However, there were many standpoints all over America. Some believed that slavery should be abolished quickly whole others believed they should put an end to new slavery and let it die out on its own. There were other opinions on what should be done about slavery but one that was possibly the most fearsome for some was that some new states could now choose if they were or were not a slave state.
Many Northerners, specifically Republicans, viewed the Supreme Court’s decision, which denied Scott’s freedom and believed African Americans to be non-citizens of the U.S. as a clear support for the system of slavery. The ruling shocked and angered Northern abolitionists and those against slavery who saw it as a major defeat in their struggle against slavery. Northerners were frightened as they thought that the Court’s ruling disturbed the fragile balance between free and slave states since it implied that slavery may spread to other areas, going against their attempts to stop this from happening. In addition, slave states no longer had to honor the “Once free, always free” rule meaning slaves who were seized to regions were freed- even if they came back to the state of Missouri which is a slave state, but that was opposed therefore, the federal government and the courts could not be expected to provide slaves with any
The Nation grew increasingly divided through the mid-1800’s over the issue of slavery, to the extent that it bled into other issues, primarily as a tensioned pretense to admis-sion of new states to the Union. Presidents prior to Polk either passively or actively re-sisted the annexation of new territories or promoting statehood, recognizing the issue of slavery and probable effects of spreading or denying slavery. The North’s ideological opposition to slavery was equally as legitimate as the South’s reasoning, but with slave labor accounting for up to 50 percent of the population in the South, there was also ac-ceptance on economical basis. Vast new lands became American territory throughout this period, while other disputed lands had boundaries
Due to their different political views and beliefs, many clashes and disagreements would occur. Southern enslavers believed that slavery was rightly justified since they had been providing them with food and housing. However, to many Northerners, slavery was seen as a "sin," and they believed it was unfair to force someone into slavery because of their origins. Tensions grew so high that they only tried to settle disagreements by fighting and involving violence. As a result, many abolitionists started lots of revolts and movements.
Gavin Hoben Mrs. Hanzlik American Studies I Honors 12/15/17 During the years of 1830-1860, many Americans began expressing their mixed feelings about a very controversial topic, slavery. Americans in the North believed that slavery was morally wrong and unconstitutional. However, the South felt believed that slavery was good for the economy as well as for commerce. Due to the differences in beliefs between the North and the South, threats of a civil war erupted.
The antebellum reform movement of abolition created conflict between differing sets of ideas and interests in the Northern and Southern regions of the United States. Northern states favored the destruction of slavery, seeing it as a violation of the “principles of justice...and the golden rule espoused by Jesus Christ” (Foner 436), and Southern states favored maintaining/expanding slavery due to the fact that “profits from cotton coursed through the whole...economy” (Alexis) down South. Slavery was what held the South in an agrarian state, while the North industrialized and the divide between the two deepened. Abolitionists fiercely battled Southern planters over the issue of slavery, for how could something so morally wrong be played off as right? The American public sphere purposely kept the discussion of bondage under wraps, but with tensions rising, it became a lot harder to oppress.
During the 1800s, slavery had become a hot topic in the United States, even though many did not even want to have the discussion about it. However, as we gained more land in the Mexican War slavery had to be addressed because the new territories were going to create an imbalance between the free and slave states. This imbalance would favor the South more than the North and give slavery the opportunity to spread further. Northerners, of course, did not agree with the idea of slavery spreading and worked to have legislation passed to support their perspective. Still, the legislation and the courts’ decision of cases related towards this matter, such as the Missouri Compromise of 1820, the Compromise of 1850, and the Kansas-Nebraska Act angered both the North and South and increased the sectionalism between them.