Homework fill-ins --
A. Abraham Lincoln of Illinois and Senator William H. Seward of New York tried to convince the voters at the Republican Convention in Chicago.
(Seward or Lincoln)
1. ______had a well-known name and a national reputation.
2. ______pledged to halt the further spread of slavery “as with a chain of steel,”
3. ______tried to reassure Southerners that a Republican administration would not “directly, or indirectly, interfere with their slaves, or with them, about their slaves.”
4. The delegates rejected ______and his talk of an “irrepressible conflict” between North and South.
5. On the third ballot, the voters at the convention nominated ______, who seemed more moderate in his views.
6. In Southern eyes, ______,was a “black Republican,” whose election would be “the greatest evil that has ever befallen this country.”
B. Three major candidates vied for office in addition to Lincoln.
(Former Know-Nothings and Whigs from the South, along with some moderate Northerners, organized the Constitutional Union Party; John Bell)
(Northern Democrats; Stephen Douglas)
(Southern Democrats; John C. Breckinridge)
7. ______backed ______and his doctrine of popular sovereignty.
8. ______backed ______, Vice-President of Kentucky.
9. ______, ignored the issue of slavery altogether. They nominated ______of Tennessee.
C. The election of 1860
(Lincoln) (Buchanan)
10. ______emerged the winner of the election of 1860.
11. Like ______in the previous election, received less than half of the popular vote.
12. ______defeated his combined opponents in the electoral vote by 180 to 123.
13. ______received no electoral votes from the South.
14. ______had sectional rather than national support.
15. ______carried every free state but didn’t even appear on the ballot in most of the free states.
D. Secession
(Louisiana) (Georgia) (South Carolina) (Mississippi) (Texas) (Alabama)
16. ______led the way, seceding from the Union on December 20, 1860.
17. Many were desperate for one last chance to preserve the slave labor system and saw secession as the only way. ______followed ______lead and seceded on January 9, 1861.
18. ______seceded the next day. Within a few weeks, ______, ______, ______, and ______had also seceded.
E. Forming the Confederacy
(Jefferson Davis) (sovereign and independent) (Alexander Stephens) (Confederacy)
19. On February 4, 1861 delegates from the secessionist states met in Montgomery, Alabama where they formed the ______.
20. The new constitution of the south stressed that each state was to be truly ______.
21. Delegates to the Confederate Constitutional convention unanimously elected former senator ______of Mississippi as President.
22. ______of Georgia was elected as Vice-President.
F. Calm before the Storm
(secession) (Seven) (Southern city) (federal government) (inauguration) (Eight)
23. As the nation awaited Lincoln’s ______in March, its citizens were confused. What would happen now?
24. ______slave states had seceded and formed a new nation.
25. ______slave states remained within the Union. Would they secede also?
26. President Buchanan was uncertain. He announced that ______was illegal, but that it also would be illegal for him to do anything about it. He tied his own hands, but in truth there was not much that he could have done.
27. One problem was that Washington, D.C. was very much a ______. There were secessionists in Congress and in all of the departments of the federal government, as well as in the president’s cabinet. Consequently, mass resignations took place.
28. To some people it seemed as if the ______were melting away. One key question remained in everyone’s mind: Would the North allow the South to leave the Union without a fight?
G. Secession and Border States
(Union) (surrounded) (Four) (border states) (bordering)
29. ______slave states—Maryland, Kentucky, Missouri, and Delaware—were undecided about secession.
30. Lincoln believed that these states would be essential to the success of the ______if war broke out.
31. They had thriving industries and good access to important rail and water routes. Also, ______North and South made the four states crucial to the movement of troops and supplies.
32. Moreover, Maryland almost ______Washington, D.C., the seat of government.
33. With militia intervention, and some political maneuvering, Lincoln kept the four ______in the Union.
H. Confederates Fire on Fort Sumter
(The Confederacy) (federal installations) (Southern forts) (Fort Sumter) (seven southernmost states)
34. The ______that had already seceded formed the Confederate States of America on February 4, 1861.
35. Confederate soldiers immediately began taking over ______in their states—courthouses, post offices, and especially forts.
36. By the time of Abraham Lincoln’s inauguration on March 4, only two ______remained in Union hands.
37. The more important was South Carolina’s ______, on an island in Charleston harbor.
38. The day after his inauguration, the new president received an urgent dispatch from the fort’s commander, Major Anderson. ______was demanding that he surrender or face an attack, and his supplies of food and ammunition would last six weeks at the most.
I. Lincoln’s Dilemma
(starting hostilities) (legitimate nation) (Republican Party)
39. The news presented Lincoln with a dilemma. If he ordered the navy to shoot its way into Charleston harbor and reinforce Fort Sumter, he would be responsible for ______, which might prompt the slave states still in the Union to secede.
40. If he ordered the fort evacuated, he would be treating the Confederacy as a ______.
41. Such an action would anger the ______, weaken his administration, and endanger the Union.
J. First Shots
(political maneuver) (surrendered) (chose war)
42. Lincoln executed a clever ______. He would not abandon Fort Sumter, but neither would he reinforce it. He would merely send in “food for hungry men.”
43. Now it was Jefferson Davis who faced a dilemma. If he did nothing, he would damage the image of the Confederacy as a sovereign, independent nation. On the other hand, if he ordered an attack on Fort Sumter, he would turn peaceful secession into war. Davis ______.
44. At 4:30 A.M. on April 12, Confederate batteries began thundering away. Charleston’s citizens watched and cheered as though it were a fireworks display. The South Carolinians bombarded the fort with more than 4,000 rounds before the Union’s Anderson ______.
K. Virginia Secedes
(Confederate states) (United) (seceded) (Union) (antislavery)
45. News of Fort Sumter’s fall ______the North. When Lincoln called for 75,000 volunteers to serve for three months, the response was overwhelming. In Iowa, 20 times the state’s quota rushed to enlist.
46. Lincoln’s call for troops provoked a very different reaction in the states of the upper South. On April 17, Virginia, unwilling to fight against other Southern states, ______—a terrible loss to the Union. Virginia was the most heavily populated state in the South and the most industrialized (with a crucial ironworks and navy yard).
47. In May, Arkansas, Tennessee, and North Carolina followed Virginia, bringing the number of ______to 11.
48. However, the western counties of Virginia were ______, so they seceded from Virginia and were admitted into the Union as West Virginia in 1863.
49. The four remaining slave states—Maryland, Delaware, Kentucky, and Missouri—remained in the ______, although many of the citizens in those states fought for the Confederacy.