Dissension of the Election

The essential question of the day was "How were the results of the Election of 1860 representative of the deep division over slavery?" To learn the answer to this question we first watched a Crash Course video by John Green to get some quick information. Then we looked at a map of the Election of 1860 to see who was most popular where. In the South, Breckenridge, who believed that there should be no limits on slavery, won the popular vote. This is quite obvious because the South relied on slavery and wanted to keep it to keep their lives and economy afloat. The North votes were dominantly for Lincoln, who believed that slavery should be abolished. The North hated slavery and was fighting to change it so it makes sense that they voted for Lincoln. States between the North and South voted differently. In some states Bell was the popular vote. He wanted to preserve the Union as it is while keeping slavery. Present day Missouri’s popular vote was for Douglas, who believed that popular sovereignty should determine the expansion of slavery. This represents the division over slavery because the majority of the North voted for a leader who is against slavery and the South voted for someone who was all for slavery. The states in the middle voted for people who didn't have a firm stance on to either have or abolish slavery. Also, in class we read about art created during the time of the Civil War and how it helps tell the story of the Election of 1860 and where people stood in their beliefs. In groups using the civil war art, the information given, and other picture resources, we created a video on how these pictures help tell the story. Below is my group’s video.

Civil War art and information found at - http://www.civilwarinart.org/exhibits/show/causes/introduction/the-election-of-1860-and-seces
Other sources are credited at the end of the video.

Info-So-Easy

In class we looked at statistics, facts, and strategies of the North and the South during the time of the Civil War. The assignment was to create an infographic to show how the differences between the two effected each strategy and the outcome of the war. I chose the statistic of population, railroad mileage, industrial workers, and percentage of slave owners. I chose population, mileage and industrial workers of the North and South because these statistics also show the advantages and disadvantages. The North exceeded the South in all of these areas which, in turn, became advantages for the North. They had more people to fight, could transport supplies and troops faster, make goods that were needed and had money from the industries. Since the South fell less in these areas the North had the upper hand. I also chose the statistic of the percentage of slave owners in the South to show how much slavery was used and valued in the region. This also showed their reason to fight. This process was a fun way to see the differences and problems that the North and South faced. I first made graphs of the different statistics to show a 'background' of what each region had during this time. Then I decided to explain the strategies after the graphs to show how the statistics effected those strategies. The infographic was a helpful and cool way of presenting data and simply explaining the topic at hand. I would recommend this method for future projects.

 

Success In The Civil War | Create infographics

The Never Addressed Elephant

We have all heard the saying ‘the elephant in the room’. This is a metaphorical saying for an obvious truth that is being either ignored or unaddressed. In the 19th century the debate over slavery was most definitely the ‘elephant in the room’ for American politics. In class we learned about important people and events during this time such as John Brown, the Compromise of 1850, and Bleeding Kansas. As we learned about these events we created a timeline. Events and or people that dealt with the idea of anti slavery went about the timeline and those of pro slavery went below. This timeline can help show how the topic of slavery was under addressed.

group timeline

 

 

Description of events

During the 19th century a big controversy of slavery arose. The North was against slavery and the South was pro slavery. With new land coming to be apart of the United States the two sides fought each other for the new land to be either pro slavery or free. In the beginning, due to the Missouri Compromise, there were 11 free states and 11 slave states, keep each side of the North and the South content. But, in 1850 California requests to join the union as a free state. Many were concerned because that would destroy the even balance between free and slave states and southerns were concerned that Free states would have more representatives in the Senate. To settle this, Henry Clay proposes a 5 Part Compromise, known of Compromise of 1850. These 5 parts dealt with the topic of slavery so that each side would be satisfied. One such of these parts was the Compromise in Washington D.C., were slave trade was abolished but owning slaves was not. The compromise of the territories stated that the territories of New Mexico, Nevada, Arizona, and Utah would be organized with no mention of slavery. As you can see the topic of slavery was sort of awkward for politicians; no one wanted to deal with it or pick a side overall but just compromised all together to keep the North and the South quiet.

 

Another event was the Kansas-Nebraska Act. This Act was meant to to convince people to settle in the unorganized territories. The Kansas- Nebraska Act stated that the statehood would be determined by popular sovereignty. This Act then leads to what is known as “Bleeding Kansas”. This opportunity to populate territories was too good for the North and the South to pass so there was a rush of settlers to go there to state their dominance. Unfortunately, once settlers starting coming there was a violent outbreak. Many died fighting for their belief of either pro or anti slavery. This was yet another poorly handled event. The politicians let the statehood up to the people so they did not have to deal with it and in turn it ended in bloody battles.

 

Finally, in the midst of these battles and haphazard decisions, Abraham Lincoln became president. Lincoln had a set plan for the whole country, unlike any other politician before, and that was to abolish slavery. Lincoln was a very passionate man who believed strongly in the value of human rights. He believed that the majority should not have the power to deny the minority (slaves) their rights and lead the country through the civil war. Unlike before, Lincoln firmly addresses the issue of slavery and tried to change it for good and not just let the people fight amongst themselves to decide.

As you can see the topic of slavery did not get the attention it deserved in the 19th century. It was quite the ‘Elephant in the Room’; no one wanted to deal with the cold hard facts. Through all of the compromises and acts no one paid attention to the fact of what slavery was and how it was wrong. Instead, it dealt with making things equal so both and North and the South could be happy. This also included letting the people fight amongst themselves to become either a free or slave state. Not until Lincoln became president was there a firm universal stand for the country. Even though that stand was not accepted but all at first, history slowly changed itself into the free country we are today.