The Divisive Politics Of Slavery

Popular Sovereignty was how a state was determined to be a free or slave state. The people of the state had to decide to either allow or deny slavery.

Ophelia Settle Egypt, informally known as Ophie, was an African American woman ahead of her time. She attained the educational status of less than one percent of the American population, was liberal and accepting of others despite the criticism around her, fought to end racism, worked independently of her husband, and believed in limiting family growth. All of Egypt’s beliefs and lifetime achievements represent a new type of woman: a woman who refuses to assimilate to her gender stereotype of weak, inferior, and domestic. Egypt dedicated her life to social work through various activities. She worked as a sociologist, researcher, teacher, director of organizations, and social worker at different times in her life. Egypt’s book, The Unwritten History of Slavery (1968), and the Planned Parenthood Clinic in Southeast Washington D.C. named after her represent Egypt’s legacy and how one person is capable of social change.

This meant that there was a possibility of there being slavery in the new territories based on the decision of the people in those territories. This would allow for the spread of slavery which in turn would expand the slave trade helping slaveholders in the South. Popular sovereignty increased sectionalism instead of reducing it. In Kansas, the vote for slavery was bombarded by people who did not live in the state causing an incorrect evaluation of what the people wanted. This led to the creation of a second illegal government and fighting between the two different governments. This fight was so bad that Kansas became known as "Bleeding Kansas".

popular sovereignty was the nation's topic during the 1850s. It was included in several important files including the Kansas-Nebraska Act and the Compromise of 1850. famous sovereignty, or the capacity of a country to determine whether or no longer allow slavery, turned into visible as a right with the aid of the Southern states and a obvious violation of the national group spirit and supremacy of the constitution by way of the Northern states. The Southerners and Northerners both wondered if the the brand new states had slaves, so that they went into new territories to vote and affect the vote . In the end, this led to fighting in the territories and new states,causing one specifically fight-troubled nation to become referred to

One effect on the issue was that the economy in the south was fueled by cultivation of staple crops that required slaves for labor. In the South slavery wasn’t thought as an evil as in the North because to the Southerners defense the slaves in their opinion were treaty in contrast to workers in England and peasants that were Irish, also the end of slave trade brought higher value to the slaves causing their owners to be less harsh because they were more valuable. Although slavery fueled the economy in the South it was not the same in the North therefore there was no complete dire need for slavery, and although the slaves probably weren’t treated as bad as the north had thought they still saw it as

Politically, slavery became one of those hot topic issues that politicians usually like to avoid speaking about because the country was divided into two different view points, pro-slavery and anti-slavery, and politicians wanted to be in everyone’s good graces to win come election time. However, when the argument came about weather or not newly inducted states could ban slavery or not, tensions rose in the government. This led to the Compromise of 1850, which allowed for stricter fugitive laws, but allowed California to be free, and New Mexico and Utah to make their decision based on popular sovereignty (the idea that the people of that state should choose). Politically, slavery left a whole mess of confusion for the new states. For example, in the Kansas- Nebraska act a railroad was to be built crossing over two new territories (Kansas and Nebraska) that allowed

As Americans were moving west to fulfill the Manifest Destiny and conquering new territories, new boundaries for the Union were having to be shaped. With the northern states having officially abolished slavery since 1804, the argument over which territories would be free or not was now coming into play. The North and South have had differing opinions regarding slavery for over sixty years, but with the topic being kept out of most, if not all, political debates the dispute never seemed to come to a head. After the

One of the last call that the opponents made before the civil war was the principle of popular sovereignty in which the people state that government exist to serve them and help them to move as a nation, over the U.S. history this sovereignty led to riots and fight between people from the same states which wanted to abolish slavery against the ones that wanted to keep

During the period before the civil war the issue of slavery began affecting American politics. Slavery was a topic that was becoming more involved in every part of the politics and moving forward as a country. Slavery became an issue in a variety of topics; creating a new state, did individual freedom won in the revolution include the right to enslave another person, should southern non-slave holders be able to vote, could a law be passed to forbid discussing a specific issue in Federal government, and finally could a State government pass a law to nullify a Federal law? These are all the key questions that American politicians had to answer without causing a civil war show how important the issue of slavery was becoming.

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 implementation of popular sovereignty was a key component of the 1850 compromise which asserted the right of the people living in a new territory to decide by vote of their territorial legislature whether or not slavery would be allowed. This method, was opposed by Southerners who believed they had a right to take their ‘property’ wherever they wished, and Northerners who believed that slavery should not be allowed to expand under any circumstances, not even if the majority of white settlers wished it to

In The Fate Of Their Country: Politicians, Slavery Extension, And The Coming Of The Civil War, Michael F. Holt effectively shows how the Civil War was caused by partisan politics and the slavery extension issue. The decisions made by northern and southern politicians from 1844 to 1861 in relation to the slavery extension issue caused the Civil War. I accept Holt’s thesis and believe that he makes a believable case. His book convinced me that foolish, selfish, and deceptive politicians made decisions that caused frustration in the lives of northern and southern Americans, which created an environment prone to civil war. It was not a disagreement over slavery itself, rather a disagreement over whether expansion into new territories would involve slavery.

There was a distress on the border dispute where Texas claimed the eastern half of the New Mexico Territory where slavery issues were still not settled.

The question of slavery and the rights of states to decide on the matter for themselves completely controlled politics in the years prior to the Civil War. Laws were passed, such as the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850, which made it so any slaves that escaped were to be sent back to their owners. Not only would these runaway slaves be punished severely, but anybody who aided them in escape would also be subject to harsh punishment. These desperate men, women, and children had no protection in the legal system and were left with no options in life other than escape. Many of these escapees had to watch friends and family be beaten, sold, or even killed and were expected to work just as hard, like nothing had happened. After losing everything, it

In your supposition, was the Civil War unavoidable? Were the North and the South destined from the earliest starting point to fight each other in the end over the servitude issue? Yes, I feel that the Civil War was basically unavoidable. Regardless of the way that, Eli Whitney's development of the cotton gin in the 1790s, the South had been on an absolutely exceptional money related and social path from the North. In the 1850s, social and political enhancements, including the dissemination of the Uncle Tom's Cabin, the Fugitive Slave Act, Bleeding Kansas, the Dred Scott decision, and John Brown's assault on Harpers Ferry, partitioned the areas. Notwithstanding