• The United States acquired new territories after the Mexican War. Americans debated whether slavery should be allowed or banned in the territories acquired from Mexico.

• The Compromise of 1850 admitted California as a free state and placed no limits on slavery in other territories. It banned the slave trade in Washington, D.C., and called for a new law dealing with the problem of enslaved African Americans who fled from slavery.

• The Fugitive Slave Act required all citizens to help catch runaway African Americans. Many Northerners who refused to obey that law worked on the Underground Railroad, a network that helped runaway African Americans escape to freedom.

• The Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854 allowed citizens in American territories to decide if slavery would be allowed there. When the pro-slavery group won the election in Kansas, an antislavery group set up a rival government. Violence broke out between them.

Section 2: Challenges to Slavery

• In the early 1850s, opponents of slavery joined to form the new Republican Party. In 1854 they won control of the House of Representatives but had almost no support in the South. The presidential race of 1856 showed how split the nation was along sectional lines.

• Dred Scott was a slave who sued for his freedom. His case reached the Supreme Court. The Court decided that the Constitution protected slavery because enslaved people were property, and the state could not take someone’s property.

• The 1858 Senate race in Illinois pitted Republican Abraham Lincoln against Democrat Stephen A. Douglas. In their debates, Lincoln and Douglas discussed differing views on slavery. Douglas won the election by a narrow margin, but Lincoln gained a national reputation.

• Abolitionist John Brown led a raid on Harpers Ferry, Virginia. Brown was captured, tried for murder and treason, and convicted of those crimes. Even so, white Southerners feared further violence.

Section 3: Secession & War

• In 1860, the Democratic Party was divided. This helped Republican Abraham Lincoln win the presidential election. He carried the North but failed to get a single electoral vote from the South.

• Following Lincoln’s election, South Carolina voted to leave the Union. Six other states joined South Carolina. Together they formed the Confederate States of America. They chose Jefferson Davis as their president.

• When Lincoln took office, he vowed to hold the country together. When Confederate forces attacked and captured Fort Sumter, he issued a call for troops. Four more states joined the Confederacy. The Civil War had begun.

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