ANTE-BELLUM ERA AND THE COMING OF THE CIVIL WAR
Objective: Understand the forces behind a new American Intellectual trend, and how those forces contributed to the political events that led to the separation of North and South in 1860.
I. The American Mind in Mid Nineteenth Century
A. Questioning the Neo-Classical ideal which said:
1. Truth comes from reason and harmony
2. Study Greece and Rome
Parthanon Second Bank of the US
3. Enlightenment and science
a. Jefferson
1. Classical Symmetry vs. Medieval a-symmetry
Monticello
2. Stress Noble emotions
a. Courage
b. Leadership
c. Patriotism
Death of Wolf-West
Agripina
3. Meritocracy should rule
Washington-Jean-Antione Houdon
b. Franklin
1. Science over Religion
2. Education over Mysticism
Artist and Museum-Peal
B. Bold New America needs a Bold New Culture
1. Jackson and the rise of the common man
a. Politics
b. Social--genre
Breaking Home Ties--Hovenden Shooting for the Beef--Mount
Coming to the Point--Mount Story Telling Time-Bingham
Verdic of the People--Bingham Fur Traders--Bingham
2. The West, Myth and Manifest Destiny
a. Tyler and Texas
b. Polk emodied the Young American Ideal
c. Results were War and Territory
3. Rise of Transcendentalism--The American Romanticism
a. Transcendentalism-Anti-science, Worship individual, Glorify nature
1. First: Subordinate thought to feelings--Stress inner self
2. Second: Worship uniqueness of individual--Faith in self-Emerson
a. Uniqueness and self reliance in Industrial society
b. Institutions Unimportant--parties and churches
1. Escape past --not be bound by it.
2. Escape chains of the Enlightenment
3. Transcend reason with intuition and faith in self
3. Third: Glorify nature--Solace in Wilderness--key is solitude
a. Mystical intuitive look at life--alienation & melancholy
1. Self is part of nature and nature is God
2. Man is insignificant in Nature
3. Simplify-Thoreau
Watteau: Game of Love
Beeches--Durand
4. Express unique American values--free from Europe
a. Democracy, individuality, freedom
b. Myth of the West-Increase Nationalism--Manifest Destiny
1. F. J. Turner “Significance of theFronteir”
2. Wm Berkeley “Westward the Course of Empire. . .”
Sierra Nevada--Bierstadt
Twilight in Wilderness--Church
b. On the Other Hand:
1. Alexis de Tocqueville
a. Democracy in America--Middle class
b. America has "No institutions of inequality"
2. Second: “Dark side” of humanity: Melville
a. Dangers facing a nation
b. Overreaches because of pride
c. Excessive exalted sense of destiny
Savage State Pastorial State-Cole Consumation-Cole Destruction-Cole Return to Natural State-Cole
c. These ideas are underneath.
1. They are the foundation on which we then act politically.
2. No instittuions to restrain human nature.
The Turbulent 50
I. Reaping the Havoc of Manifest Destiny and Expansion
A. Mexican War, Territory, Slavery and the Compromise of 1850
B. Election of 1852--No major issues
1. Democrats - Franklin Pierce
a. Pro-Southern “Doughface”
b. Seen as best man to enforce the Compromise
2. Whigs-Winfield Scott--redo American System
a. Haughty
b. Whigs dump Filmore and go military again
c. Whigs split
a. S. Whigs doubt loyalty to Fugitive Slave Law
b. Huge win for Pierce
3. Election showed which party best supported Compromise 1850
II. Peace for a moment
A. Historiography! Slavery in the territories—it won’t go away.
1. Charles W Ramsdell: “The Natural Limits of Slavery Expansion.”
a. Cotton could not spread past East Texas
b. Nature had stopped slavery.
c. It would probably die by 1880
d. No need for Republicans or abolitionists
2. Harry Jaffa: “The Natural Limits of Slavery Expansion.”
a. Cotton and slavery were not the same thing
b. Blacks could work other fields
c. South could expand internally
1. South made profit (Stampp)
2. Southerners needed to expand
d. Thus, need Lincoln and Wilmot to stop expansion
B. Manifest destiny fever
1. Young Americans sought expansion-Japan next
a. Commodore Matthew Perry
b. US sails into Edo Bay—1853—Trade treaty
2. Gasden Purchase-1853
a. Everyone loves the Gadsden purchase
b. At least most people do
3. Clayton-Bulwer Treaty-1850
4. Perhaps Cuba and Nicaragua too
a. Ostend Manifesto
1. Pierce secret negotiation
2. Cuba for $100 million
b. Filibusters to Nicaragua
C. At this point—“The Conjunction”
1. Politics—Nationalism—Sectionalism
a. Manifest Destiny and expansion
b. Wilmot
c. Compromise
2. Economics role—RR, Cotton, Industry
3. Social issues
a. Art
b. Philosophy & Literature
D. Events move swiftly
1. Enforcing compromise of 1850 and fugitive slaves
a. Victory for the South was costly
b. Resentment grew in the North
2. Harriett B. Stowe wrote Uncle Tom's Cabin
a. Stung Northern consciousness
b. Killed chance of taking Cuba
3. Despite resentment, Slavery difficult to touch
a. Robinson
b. No policy available to stop it
c. Abolitionists had little power
1. Garrison could only burn Constitution
2. Southerners held great pol power
d. Personal Liberty Laws - Unconstitutional
1. Prigg v. Penn
2. Ableman v Booth
4. Southerners reacted quickly with hostility to Stowe's portrayal of slavery
E. 1854 “Everything flies apart”
1. Stephen A. Douglas --"I'll be like Polk"
a. Young American
b. Election showed Americans want MD
1. Let’s expand (Whitman and Melville)
2. New markets—industrial growth
3. Use RR to knit nation together
4. Aggressive foreign policy
2. KANSAS NEBRASKA ACT 1854
a. Use Railroad to knit nation together (JCC)
1. Chicago over St. Louis
2. Gadsden threaten Northern interests
3. Introduce new plan to counter Gadsden
4. Illinois as hub—“Douglas 1856”
b. To stop S. filibuster, repeal Mo. Comp 1820 (S. wants route thru Az)
1. Allow Popular Sovereignty to decide
2. Douglas expected expansion fever to unite Dems
c. Not anticipate catastrophe
1. Destroyed compromise of 1820 and 1850
2. Ended Northern help on Fugitive Slave Law
3. N. passed more Personal Liberty Laws
F. Kansas-Nebraska Bill caused chaos.
1. Many Northerners saw 36'30" as sanctified
2. South cool at first but felt needed to support
3. Harmony of Compromise of 1850 gone
a. Tension—Wilmot Dem in North unhappy
b. S. Dem supported SAD
c. Then in 1854 election 65 N. Dem defeated--their numbers drop
from 90 to 25 in HOR
d. Killed chance to buy Cuba
4. Whigs also split
a. Southern Whigs joined S. Democrats
b. Northern Whigs looked for a party
5. So, political chaos ensued
6. As a result, Rise of two new parties
a. Republican rose as nativism fizzles (Northern Whigs and Free Soil
Dems join Republicans)
b. Know Nothings become the American Party (Cotton Whigs+Anti Imig)
7. While parties fell into shambles, Kansas exploded
a. N. E. Immigrant Aid Soc. vs Boarder Ruffians
b. Lecompton v. Topeka
1. First elections
2. Two capitals
3. One based on fraudulent election; the other illegal
c. Pierce did nothing
d. HOR sat frozen in inaction
e. John Brown Raids
8. Debate on Kansas in Congress
a. Key issue: SAD and Pop Sov now? When?
2. Hyperbole and Sumner-Brooks Affair galvanized the North
G. In the Midst of all this--Election of 1856
1. Democrats
a. Dump Douglas
b. James “out of the country” Buchanan
c. Keep Pop Sovereignty
2. Whigs gone--Split into two new parties
a. American Party-(Know Nothing) Anti Immigration’--Fillmore
b. Republicans-John C Fremont-”Free Soil”
"I oppose twin barbarians of slavery and polygamy in territories"
3. Buchanan wins
a. But Republicans see IL, PN, IN, NJ
b. Find a more conservative candidate wo past
H. Was war inevitable at this point? "Irreconcilable Conflict"?
1. Buchanan said let the Supreme Court decide slavery in the territory issue
2. Dred Scott v. Sanford-1857 and return of R. Taney
a. Slaves can’t sue
b. 5th Amendment; 36’30” void
c. “Thunderclap”
d. South delighted
e. SAD “stunned”
3. Lecompton again
a. Buchanan told Congress to Pass it.
b. But ironically, Douglas now opposed Lecompton
1. As a result, the South turned against Douglas
2. After the Dred Scott decision, the South did not need Douglas
c. So, by mid 1850s where does American stand on issue of slavery?
1. Is Wilmot the same as abolition?
2. Should South worry about Wilmot rhetoric?
3. What if Ramsdell is right?- If so, is Douglas also right?
4. If Douglas is right, is Wilmot a concern?
d. But, if Jaffa is right, is Wilmot a threat to slavery in the territories?
1. If North follows Wilmot, is slavery in South threatened?
2. If Phillips & Wilmot are right, is Southern society threatened?
3. Finally, is the Republican party a threat to slavery in the 1850s?
4. Rise of Lincoln –1858: Abe became a national figure-Threat to Slavery?
a. Lincoln-Douglas Debates—High level debates made AL nationally known
1. Abe’s thesis was-“Douglas is part of a plot to expand slavery”
a. Lincoln said: SAD could not be counted on to stop slavery
1. “I am different from SAD” (Of course, he has to say this)
2. “House Divided” (Radical or not?)
a. Nation has reached a crisis point between slavery
and freedom
b. A house divided against itself cannot stand
c. KA & Dred Scott are evidence of plot to nationalize slaves
d. Stop spread & put it on road to ultimate extinction
e. This is as radical as Abe ever gets.
“Let’s take slavery out of the realm of moral and legal dispute. It is an issue of ‘free labor and self interest’. There will be another Supreme Court decision declaring that the Constitution does not permit a state to exclude slavery. We shall lie down pleasantly, dreaming that the people of Missouri are on the verge of making their state free and we shall awake to the reality instead that the court has made Illinois a slave state... Either the opponents of slavery will arrest the further spread of it, and place it where the public mind shall rest in the belief that it is in the course of ultimate extinction; or its advocates will push it forward till it shall become alike lawful in all the states, old and new”
b. Douglas response—“You see!! I told you. Lincoln is an Abolitionists”
1. He plans to use the Republican party to destroy slavery
2. He is pro abolition; he is a negrophile.
3. SAD=UB Phillips here
c. Lincoln answered at Charleston, IL
“I am not, nor ever have been in favor of brining about in any way the social and political equality of the white and black races (applause); that I am not, nor ever have been in favor of making voters or jurors of negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office nor to intermarry with white people. And as much as they cannot so live, while they do remain together there must be the position of superior and inferior, and I as much as any man am in favor of having the superior position assigned to the white race.
“There is a natural disgust in the minds of nearly all white people to the idea of indiscriminate amalgamation of the white and black races.” A natural disgust in the minds of all white people. Douglas is trying to tar and feather me with this, and l don’t buy it.
Douglas wants you to believe that I’m for the amalgamation of the races, and I’m not. Now l protest against this counterfeit logic, which concludes that because I do not want a black woman for a slave, I must necessarily want her for a wife. I need not have her for either. I can just leave her alone. ln some respects she is certainly my equal; in others she is not; but in her natural right to eat the bread she earns with her own hands without asking leave of anyone else, she is my equal, and the equal of all others.
This notion that blacks have natural rights does not mean that they have equal standing in society. Judge Douglas is especially horrified at the thought of mixing blood by the white and black races. Agreed for once-a thousand times agreed. There are white men enough to marry all the white women, and black men enough to marry all the black women, so let them be married.”
b. Then Lincoln asked “The Question” at Freeport
1. “Do you believe in the Constitution?”
2. “If so, how can you still support Popular Sovereignty?”
3. To win in Illionis—SAD kills himself with Southern Dems here.
a. He needed Northern support
b. Yes, by denying police protection
5. The John Brown Raid--1859
a. Harper’s Ferry
b. Was violence the only way?
1. Perhaps, but what was northern attitude about Brown?
2. Lincoln: "Brown was like others who brood over the oppression of a people till he fancies himself commissioned by Heaven to liberate them.
He ventures out and ends in little else than his own execution."
c. So, Traitor or Martyr?
1. Brown seen as hero to Abolitionists in the North
2. Southerners killed 1000 blacks
d. Historical Debate—James Gilbert-Martin Duberman
JAMES N. GILBERT
“A BEHAVIORAL ANALYSIS OF JOHN BROWN: MARTYR OR TERRORIST”
I. Terrorism has become more important in modern America after 1993 and 2001.
A. Always associated with foreign ideas not as American.
B. Thesis: Brown’s action in the 1850 made him comparable to modern acts of terrorism
C. Definition: “Unlawful use of force or violence against persons or property to intimidate or coerce a government, the civilian population, or any segment thereof, in furtherance of
political or social objectives.”
1. Psychologists believe that the most common type of terrorist has a psychopathic or sociopathic personality.
2. Classic traits of psychopath—impulsiveness, lack of guilt, inability to experience emotion.
II. How did Brown fit this definition?
A. He was clearly a criminal.
1. He embezzled, assaulted with a deadly weapon
2. Murdered five Kansas men.
B. He was delusional. He said:
1. Society is sick and cannot be cured by half measures of reform.
2. The state is in itself violent and can be overcome only by violence.
3. No legal remedy is possible
4. Violence is justified to ensure a "higher" morality.
5. “Purge is land with blood.”