South Carolina And The United States Essay

The secession of South Carolina on December 20, 1860, by a vote of 169-0 was a response to the election of Abraham Lincoln of 1860. Lincoln perceived as an abolitionist wanted to contain slavery rather than ending it. The majority party above the Mason-Dixon line were Republicans and below were primarily Democrats and Republicans were viewed as abolitionists. The election of a Republican threatened the South’s status quo. The primary catalyst for secession was based on slavery. Different social cultures and political beliefs developed due to the South’s intimate and reliant relationship on slavery. Southern whites feared the end of slavery and this paranoia was shared among plantation slave owners and white Yeoman farmers. Southern whites felt that the North were threatening the supposed tranquility of the South. The South’s agrarian economy, honor, and independence were believed to be in danger. Slavery was intertwined with the South’s social, cultural, and economic makeup. As a result of slavery, the South developed a paternalistic culture and racial ideology of white supremacy. The perceived notion that the North was influencing it’s political and social beliefs on the South lead them to believe that secession was the only act of self-preservation. The growing differences between the South and North made it difficult to negotiate. This fear was exaggerated and accelerated the South’s eventual implosion. The South believed that without slavery it would self-destruct and

Sectional differences between the North and the South have caused the two regions to disagree on multiple issues since the establishment of the United States. The North’s economy was primarily based on industry, while the South’s economy was primarily based on agriculture, which greatly changed the two section’s desire and need for slaves. When the United States began annexing new territory, disputes over the expansion of slavery became prominent. In the Missouri Compromise of 1820, Missouri was added to the Union as a slave state while Maine was added as a free state in order to maintain the balance between slave and free states, and slavery was prevented from extending above the 36th parallel line. In order to follow the guidelines of the Missouri Compromise, Southerners looked westward in order to expand slavery. Southerners supported the extension of slavery into western territories because it allowed them to use free labor to harvest cotton and other crops, and the addition of new slave states would strengthen the South in the House of Representatives, because more states would vote for policies that favored slaveholders. Northerners were against the expansion of slavery into Western territories because they believed slave labor undermined free white labor and took away job opportunities, and would disrupt the balance between free and slave states. Controversy over the expansion of slavery into western territories between the years of 1845-1861 contributed to the

At the time, the United States contained twenty-two states, evenly divided between slave and free. In the years leading up to the Missouri Compromise of 1820, tensions began to rise between proslavery and antislavery factions within the U.S. Congress and across the country. They reached a boiling point after Missouri’s 1819 request for admission to the Union as a slave state, which threatened to upset the delicate balance between slave states and free states. To keep the peace, Congress came up with a two-part compromise, granting Missouri’s request but also admitting Maine as a free state. It also passed an amendment that drew an imaginary line across the former Louisiana Territory, establishing a boundary between free and slave regions that remained the law of the land until it was repealed by the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854.

To avoid military confrontation, Congress passed a different tariff that South Carolina was able to accept. The South took such measures because they felt that the North (Washington) was attacking them by passing laws that favored one section of the country’s economy over theirs. South Carolina later repealed their Nullification

The Compromise of 1820 brought both sides of the slavery debate to an agreement. In 1819, Missouri proposed to join the Union as a slave state. If Missouri joined as a slave state, this would teeter the balance in the House of Representatives with a greater number of pro-slavery Congressman. In the compromise, Congress initiated a two-part plan; to admit Missouri as a slave state and Maine as a free state and a new boundary line was drawn at longitude 36◦ 30’ through the former Louisiana Territory separating free and slave states.1 The compromise settled each side for a time, but the sectional and political conflicts continued to escalate.

In 1819, the nation created a balance Senate with eleven free states and eleven slave states. In the other words, the free states and slave states have equal representation in Senate, but the balance eventually destroyed when the Missouri Territory wanted to enter the United States as a slave state. The Northern states opposed Missouri to enter the United States as a slave state while the Southern states favored it. They, later on, created the Missouri Compromise that Maine enters as a free state, Missouri enters as a slave state, and any territory/state north of the 36°30′ latitude line would be free territory/state and below it would be slave territory/state. President Thomas Jefferson viewed this compromise as being temporary because as the nation moves west (manifest destiny), slavery would increase. The United States expand from just the west of Mississippi River to the Pacific Ocean and to Mexico when America fought in the Mexican-American War. America won but the Massachusetts House of Representation believed that the war would lead to the expansion of slavery or slave states (Doc.#4). Mexico gave up California, Nevada, Utah, Arizona, part of Colorado, and part of Mexico, but California’s admission created conflict. It created an unbalance

In 1819, the House of Representatives had brought forth a bill with the idea of making Missouri a state. At this time, the Union consisted of eleven free states and eleven slave states. Once Missouri was established as a state, it upset the balance as Missouri would become a slave state, and there would be one more slave state than there would be free states. The southerners were happy about this decision while the Northerners feared this would lead to the extension on slavery in the north eventually. As a solution for all of the controversial arguments, the Missouri Compromise was made. In an effort to balance the amount of free states and the amount of slave states, in 1820, Maine was made a free states which in return allowed for Missouri to become a slave state. As well as balancing the number of free and slave states, the Missouri Compromise also denied slavery in the rest of the Louisiana Purchase, which was the boundary in the southern part of Missouri. Soon after this compromise had been made, Missouri decided to ban free blacks from the territory in which they obtained. Because of their decision to do this, the Union prohibited Missouri from joining until 1821, which was when a second Missouri compromise was made. The second Missouri Compromise forbid Missouri from inequity towards citizens coming from another state, yet left them the option to decide whether or not free blacks were considered to be citizens. Overall, the south took this as a victory over the

The Nullification Crisis, which transpired under Andrew Jackson’s administration created a controversy not only during its time, but also in the years to follow and ultimately was one of the many causes of the Civil War years later. The Nullification crisis soon developed in the early 1830’s when the state of South Carolina began to have issues with the protective tariff (which was designed to protect the industry in the northern United States by taxing imports). At this point in history, many of the leaders of South Carolina were under the idea that a state did not have to follow a federal law and could “nullify” the law. This was a result that many colonists from South Carolina felt that the protective tax was benefiting the

In 1819, the Union existed in a precarious balance of eleven free states and eleven slave states, with western expansion threatening to upset it. Although the Northwest Ordinance did not define an explicit line of demarcation between future slave and free states, the generally lateral nature of westward expansion mitigated the need for one. However, when the territory of Missouri applied for admission to the Union as a slave state, crisis ensued. Representative James Tallmadge, Jr. incited chaos when he proposed an amendment to the bill for Missouri’s admission that would prohibit the further introduction of slaves into Missouri and mandate the gradual end of slavery. After the amendment was struck down in the senate, several northern reform groups began protesting. Former Federalists jumped on the opportunity to return to politics. Southerners were equally aggravated because, as they viewed it, slavery was a property issue, and therefore a state issue, not a federal one. Only through ‘The Great Compromiser’, Henry Clay’s uncanny ability to settle disputes, was the Missouri Compromise reached by deciding that Maine’s application for statehood would retain balance. To prevent further confusion the southern border of Missouri, the 36º30' parallel, was established as the demarcating line. The Compromise only temporarily cooled tensions between the

Following the Louisiana Purchase, Congress wanted to create a policy to guide the expansion of slavery into the new western territory. Missouri’s application for statehood as a slave state sparked bitter debate. Pro-slavery legislators from Missouri would give the pro-slavery faction a congressional majority. They compromised by agreeing that Missouri would be a slave state, but Maine would be admitted as a free state. This is one of the many different conflicts that happened between the North and the South. The North wanted to abolish slavery, while the South depended on slavery. This many arguments caused disunity between the two and eventually lead to the Civil

Newly acquired states would present another issue which would lead to tension between the North and the South. Which would be slave and which would be non-slave? The United States government was trying to make an equal balance between slave states and free states. Missouri wanted to be a free state but because they already had slaves, Congress denied this. The Compromise of 1850 was created by Henry Clay and others to deal with the balance between slave and free states, otherwise known as northern and southern interests. According to the Compromise of 1850, Texas would relinquish the land in dispute, but in compensation, be given 10 million dollars to be used to pay off its war debt to Mexico. Also, the territories of New Mexico, Nevada, Arizona, and Utah would be organized without mention of slavery.

After the annexation of Texas and the Mexican American war, controversy over slavery had once again arose to a national level. The vast territory that the United States had acquired raised questions such as, should the territory allow slavery or should it be proclaimed as a free one? Or should the inhabitants be able to choose for themselves? The sectional unity in slave states and in free states were threated especially when California petitioned the congress to enter the union as a free slave challenging the balance of slave and free states organized by the Missouri Compromise.

The role of territories played a great role in the division of the United States prior to the Civil War. The North and the South states could not agree or compromise on slavery. There was a sectional divide between the North and the South. The South was trying to sustain and utilize slavery. The North wanted to end Slavery. Slavery was becoming more divisive and it threatened to expand westward because people who were non slave holders did not want to complete with slaveholders in new territories. Missouri prepared to enter the Union as a slave state and to balance it out Maine would enter a free state. The United States had soon entered war with Mexico over Texas and its western territories. The issue of expanding slavery had resurfaced. Slavery

Southerners believes that if the United States could forbid slavery in Missouri, they could do so elsewhere. It 1820 congress finally agreed that slavery would be allowed in Missouri, but at the same time Maine would be carved out and admitted to the union as a free state. They also agreed that as the United States Expanded westward, states north of the 36 and a half degrees North would be free states, while states south of that would be slave states. This angered the north because under the compromise the new slave states covered more land than that of the new free states. Northerners worried that another slave state might increase the power of the southern states in the government.

During the years leading up to the civil war, the issue of slavery was the main focus of most politicians. The people in the North were anti-slavery and wanted slavery to be gone forever. The people in the South, some who owned slaves, thought that slavery was a okay and that it should be legal. One of the first laws passed that had to do with slavery was the Missouri Compromise in 1820. In early 1819, Missouri applied to become a state of the union. At this time, there were 11 states that allowed slavery and 11 that did not. This balance was crucial because it meant that there was equal representation in congress for both sides. But Missouri would become a slave state, tipping the balance in favor of the South. To address