period 5 key terms

Elias Howe -Massachusetts-born inventor of the sewing machine. Unable to convince American manufacturers to adopt his invention, he briefly moved to England before returning to the United States to find his sewing machine popularized by Isaac Singer. Howe won a patent infringement suit against Singer in 1854 and continued to produce sewing machines until his death.

- Families sewed their pants, shirts, and dresses using a needle and thread. But Elias Howe changed all that. Born on July 9, 1819, Howe came up with another way to make clothes. He patented the first practical American sewing machine in 1846. -

Samuel F.B. Morse -(1791-1872) Inventor of the telegraph and the telegraphic code that bears his name. He led the effort to connect Washington and Baltimore by telegraph and transmitted the first long-distance message—"What hath God wrought?"—in May 1844. -To transmit messages across telegraph wires, in the 1830s Morse and Alfred Vail created what came to be known as Morse code

- Samuel Morse developed a code (bearing his name) that assigned a set of dots and dashes to each letter of the English alphabet and allowed for the simple transmission of complex messages across telegraph lines. In 1844, Morse sent his first telegraph message, from Washington, D.C., to Baltimore, Maryland; by 1866, a telegraph line had been laid across the Atlantic Ocean from the U.S. to Europe. -Another improvement, by the famed inventor Thomas Alva Edison (1847-1931) in 1874, was the Quadruplex system, which allowed for four messages to be transmitted simultaneously using the same wire.

Ostend Manifesto (1852) -Secret Franklin Pierce administration proposal to purchase or, that failing, to wrest militarily Cuba from Spain. Once leaked, it was quickly abandoned due to vehement opposition from the North. -Presidents John Quincy Adams and Thomas Jefferson expressed great interest in Cuba

- a document written in 1854 that described the rationale for the United States to purchase Cuba from Spain while implying that the U.S. should declare war if Spain refused. Cuba's annexation had long been a goal of U.S. slaveholding expansionists. At the national level, American leaders had been satisfied to have the island remain in weak Spanish hands so long as it did not pass to a stronger power such as Britain or France. The Ostend Manifesto proposed a shift in foreign policy, justifying the use of force to seize Cuba in the name of national security. It resulted from debates over slavery in the United States, Manifest Destiny, and the Monroe Doctrine, as slaveholders sought new territory for slavery's expansion.

Sumner-Brooks Incident -Sumner is best known for the caning he received at the hands of Preston Brooks on the Senate floor in 1856.

-1856 - Charles Sumner gave a two day speech on the Senate floor. He denounced the South for crimes against Kansas and singled out Senator Andrew Brooks of South Carolina for extra abuse. Brooks beat Sumner over the head with his cane, severely crippling him.

Lecompton Constitution -Proposed Kansas constitution, whose ratification was unfairly rigged so as to guarantee slavery in the territory. Initially ratified by proslavery forces, it was later voted down when Congress required that the entire constitution be put up for a vote.

-A vocal supporter of slaveholder rights, President Buchanan endorsed the Lecompton Constitution before Congress. While the president received the support of the Southern Democrats, many Northern Democrats, led by Stephen A. Douglas, sided with the Republicans in opposition to the constitution -The pro-slavery constitution suggested for Kansas' admission to the union. It was rejected.

"Bleeding Kansas" -Civil war in Kansas over the issue of slavery in the territory, fought intermittently until 1861, when it merged with the wider national Civil War. -Said to have been coined by Horace Greeley's New York Tribune, the label "Bleeding Kansas" was first fixed on that strife-ridden territory by antislavery publicists.

-Bleeding Kansas is the term used to described the period of violence during the settling of the Kansas territory. In 1854 the Kansas-Nebraksa Act overturned the Missouri Compromise's use of latitude as the boundary between slave and free territory and instead, using the principle of popular sovereignty, decreed that the residents would determine whether the area became a free state or a slave state. Proslavery and free-state settlers flooded into Kansas to try to influence the decision. Violence soon erupted as both factions fought for control. - Abolitionist John Brown led anti-slavery fighters in Kansas before his famed raid on Harpers Ferry.

House-Divided Speech -Abraham Lincoln's 1858 "House Divided" speech catapults him into the national consciousness with its bold moral assessment of the future of American slavery. -The speech became the launching point for his unsuccessful campaign for the Senate seat held by Stephen A. Douglas; this campaign would climax with the Lincoln-Douglas debates of 1858

-In his acceptance speech for his nomination to the Senate in June, 1858, Lincoln paraphrased from the Bible: "A house divided against itself cannot stand." He continued, "I do not believe this government can continue half slave and half free, I do not expect the Union to be dissolved - I do not expect the house to fall - but I do believe it will cease to be divided."

Tenure of Office Act (1867) -Required the president to seek approval from the Senate before removing appointees. When Andrew Johnson removed his secretary of war in violation of the act, he was impeached by the House but remained in office when the Senate fell one vote short of removing him.

-Congress used this controversial law as the legal basis for its impeachment case against President Andrew Johnson in 1868. Seeking to limit his power to interfere with Radical (or even moderate) Reconstruction in the South, Congress passed it on March 2, 1867. The bill prohibited the president from removing officials appointed by and with the advice of the Senate without senatorial approval. -In 1878 the act initially prevented President Rutherford B. Hayes, as part of his effort at civil service reform, from removing Chester A. Arthur and Alonzo B.

Compromise of 1850 -Admitted California as a free state, opened New Mexico and Utah to popular sovereignty, ended the slave trade (but not slavery itself) in Washington, D.C., and introduced a more stringent fugitive slave law. Widely opposed in both the North and South, it did little to settle the escalating dispute over slavery. -The compromise was the last major involvement in national affairs of Senators Henry Clay of Kentucky, Daniel Webster of Massachusetts, and John C. Calhoun of South Carolina, all of whom had had exceptional careers in the Senate.

-Divisions over slavery in territory gained in the Mexican-American (1846-48). War were resolved in the Compromise of 1850. It consisted of laws admitting California as a free state, creating Utah and New Mexico territories with the question of slavery in each to be determined by popular sovereignty, settling a Texas-New Mexico boundary dispute in the former's favor, ending the slave trade in Washington, D.C., and making it easier for southerners to recover fugitive slaves.

Carpetbaggers -Pejorative used by Southern whites to describe Northern businessmen and politicians who came to the South after the Civil War to work on Reconstruction projects or invest in Southern infrastructure.

-During and immediately after the Civil War, many northerners headed to the southern states, driven by hopes of economic gain, a desire to work on behalf of the newly emancipated slaves or a combination of both. These "carpetbaggers"-whom many in the South viewed as opportunists looking to exploit and profit from the region's misfortunes-supported the Republican Party, and would play a central role in shaping new southern governments during Reconstruction.

Confederate States of America -Government established after seven southern states seceded from the Union. Later joined by four more states from the upper South. -Robert E. Lee (1807-70) served as a military officer in the U.S. Army, a West Point commandant and the legendary general of the Confederate Army during the American Civil War

-During the American Civil War, the Confederate States of America consisted of the governments of 11 Southern states that seceded from the Union in 1860-61, carrying on all the affairs of a separate government and conducting a major war until defeated in the spring of 1865. Convinced that their way of life, based on slavery, was irretrievably threatened by the election of President Abraham Lincoln (November 1860), the seven states of the Deep South (Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, South Carolina and Texas) seceded from the Union during the following months.

Massachusetts 54th Regiment -one of the first African-American regiments organized to fight for the union in the Civil War, led an attack on Ft. Wagner near Charleston, SC -Fathers and sons (some as young as 16) enlisted together. The most famous enlistees were Charles and Lewis Douglass, two sons of the abolitionist Frederick Douglass.

-Early in February 1863, the abolitionist Governor John A. Andrew of Massachusetts issued the Civil War's first call for black soldiers. Massachusetts did not have many African-American residents, but by the time 54th Infantry regiment headed off to training camp two weeks later more than 1,000 men had volunteered. Many came from other states, such as New York, Indiana and Ohio; some even came from Canada. One-quarter of the volunteers came from slave states and the Caribbean.

Ex Parte Milligan - Civil War-era case in which the Supreme Court ruled that military tribunals could not be used to try civilians if civil courts were open. -Lambdin P. Milligan and four others were accused of planning to steal Union weapons and invade Union prisoner-of-war camps. -The argument for the United States was delivered by Benjamin F. Butler, a New York lawyer and state legislator, and future Governor of Massachusetts.

-Ex parte Milligan was a United States Supreme Court case that ruled that the application of military tribunals to citizens when civilian courts are still operating is unconstitutional. It was also controversial because it was one of the first cases after the end of the American Civil War.

Habeas corpus -Petition requiring law enforcement officers to present detained individuals before the court to examine the legality of the arrest. Protects individuals from arbitrary state action. Suspended by Lincoln during the Civil War.

-Federal judge Roger Taney, the chief justice of the Supreme Court (and also the author of the infamous Dred Scott decision), issued a ruling that President Lincoln did not have the authority to suspend habeas corpus -Civil liberty that was suspended by Lincoln in defiance of the Constitution and Supreme Court's chief justice. This was done so that anti-Unionists could be summarily arrested.

Annexation of Texas -U.S. made Texas a state in 1845. Joint resolution - both houses of Congress supported annexation under Tyler, and he signed the bill shortly before leaving office -part of John Tyler's presidential campaign

-Following Texas' successful war of independence against Mexico in 1836, President Martin van Buren refrained from annexing Texas after the Mexicans threatened war. Accordingly, while the United States extended diplomatic recognition to Texas, it took no further action concerning annexation until 1844, when President John Tyler restarted negotiations with the Republic of Texas.

Aroostook War -Series of clashes between American and Canadian lumberjacks in the disputed territory of northern Maine, resolved when a permanent boundary was agreed upon in 1842. - Both sides engaged in a series of arrests, and as tensions escalated, American President Martin Van Buren dispatched Brigadier General Winfield Scott to the disputed area, and Congress in the summer of 1839 authorized a 50,000-man force to be placed at Van Buren's disposal in the event of an invasion.

-For decades after the American Revolution, a boundary dispute between Maine and New Brunswick simmered until Canadian lumberjacks were spotted felling trees in disputed territory near the Aroostook River on December 29, 1838. Two days later, the rival timber men drew arms, but the standoff ended when a black bear attacked three of the Canadians. Maine dispatched its land agent and volunteer militiamen to arrest the New Brunswickers, but the Canadians ended up seizing the land agent instead.

Fort Sumter -South Carolina location where Confederate forces fired the first shots of the Civil War in April of 1861, after Union forces attempted to provision the fort.

-Fort Sumter is an island fortification located in Charleston Harbor, South Carolina. Originally constructed in 1829 as a coastal garrison, Fort Sumter is most famous for being the site of the first shots of the Civil War (1861-65). U.S. Major Robert Anderson occupied the unfinished fort in December 1860 following South Carolina's secession from the Union, initiating a standoff with the state's militia forces. When President Abraham Lincoln announced plans to resupply the fort, Confederate General P.G.T. Beauregard bombarded Fort Sumter on April 12, 1861. After a 34-hour exchange of artillery fire, Anderson and 86 soldiers surrendered the fort on April 13.

Ku Klux Klan -An extremist, paramilitary, right-wing secret society founded in the mid-nineteenth century and revived during the 1920s. It was antiforeign, antiblack, anti-Jewish, antipacifist, anti-Communist, anti-internationalist, anti-evolutionist, and antibootlegger, but pro-Anglo-Saxon and pro-Protestant. Its members, cloaked in sheets to conceal their identities, terrorized freedmen and sympathetic whites throughout the South after the Civil War. By the 1890s, Klan-style violence and Democratic legislation succeeded in virtually disenfranchising all southern blacks. -Ulysses S. Grant promptly used in 1871 to crush Klan activity in South Carolina and other areas of the South

-Founded in 1866, the Ku Klux Klan (KKK) extended into almost every southern state by 1870 and became a vehicle for white southern resistance to the Republican Party's Reconstruction-era policies aimed at establishing political and economic equality for blacks. Its members waged an underground campaign of intimidation and violence directed at white and black Republican leaders. Though Congress passed legislation designed to curb Klan terrorism, the organization saw its primary goal-the reestablishment of white supremacy-fulfilled through Democratic victories in state legislatures across the South in the 1870s. -Leading Confederate general Nathan Bedford Forrest was chosen as the first leader, or "grand wizard," of the Klan; he presided over a hierarchy of grand dragons, grand titans and grand cyclopses

Sherman's March to the Sea - Union general William Tecumseh Sherman's destructive march through Georgia. An early instance of "total war," purposely targeting infrastructure and civilian property to diminish morale and undercut the Confederate war effort. -Major General George Thomas took some 60,000 men to meet the Confederates in Nashville, while Sherman took the remaining 62,000 on an offensive march through Georgia to Savannah, "smashing things" (he wrote) " to the sea."

-From November 15 until December 21, 1864, Union General William T. Sherman led some 60,000 soldiers on a 285-mile march from Atlanta to Savannah, Georgia. The purpose of this "March to the Sea" was to frighten Georgia's civilian population into abandoning the Confederate cause. Sherman's soldiers did not destroy any of the towns in their path, but they stole food and livestock and burned the houses and barns of people who tried to fight back.

Green backs -Name for Union paper money not backed by gold or silver. Value would fluctuate depending on status of the war -When President Abraham Lincoln assumed office, he understood the importance of money for the war effort. With this in mind, Lincoln appointed Salmon P. Chase as Secretary of the Treasury. As Secretary, Chase alone was authorized to act on all matters pertaining to the country's finances. Chase, like almost everyone at the time, underestimated the duration and cost of the war. Within a few months it was clear that the costs of the war would run far beyond the government's limited income from tariffs and excises.

-Greenbacks were paper currency (printed in green on the back) issued by the United States during the American Civil War. They were in two forms: Demand Notes, issued in 1861-1862, and United States Notes issued in 1862-1865. They were legal tender by law, but were not backed by gold or silver, only the credibility of the U.S. government.

Uncle Tom's Cabin - Harriet Beecher Stowe's widely read novel that dramatized the horrors of slavery. It heightened northern support for abolition and escalated the sectional conflict.

-Harriet Beecher Stowe's anti-slavery novel, Uncle Tom's Cabin, is published. The novel sold 300,000 copies within three months and was so widely read that when President Abraham Lincoln met Stowe in 1862, he reportedly said, "So this is the little lady who made this big war."

Matthew C. Perry and the Opening of Japan -(1794-1858) American naval officer sent by Millard Fillmore to negotiate a trade deal with Japan. Backed by an impressive naval fleet, Perry showered Japanese negotiators with lavish gifts. Combining military bravado with diplomatic finesse, he negotiated the landmark Treaty of Kanagawa in 1854, which ended Japan's two centuries of isolation.

-He was the military leader who convinced the Japanese to sign a treaty in 1853 with the U.S. The treaty allowed for a commercial foot in Japan which was helpful with furthering a relationship with Japan. - he met with American-born Sinologist Samuel Wells Williams, who provided Chinese language translations of his official letters

Lincoln-Douglas Debates - Series of debates between Abraham Lincoln and Stephen Douglas during the U.S. Senate race in Illinois. Douglas won the election, but Lincoln gained national prominence and emerged as the leading candidate for the 1860 Republican nomination.

-Historians have traditionally regarded the series of seven debates between Stephen A. Douglas and Abraham Lincoln during the 1858 Illinois state election campaign as among the most significant statements in American political history. The issues they discussed were not only of critical importance to the sectional conflict over slavery and states' rights but also touched deeper questions that would continue to influence political discourse. As Lincoln said, the issues would be discussed long after "these poor tongues of Judge Douglas and myself shall be silent."

Gadsden Purchase -Acquired additional land from Mexico for $10 million to facilitate the construction of a southern transcontinental railroad. -The purchase was the last territorial acquisition in the contiguous United States to add a large area to the country.

-In 1853, the Gadsden Purchase added about 30,000 square miles of Mexican territory to the United States and fixed the boundaries of the "lower 48" where they are today. -purchased by the United States in a treaty signed on December 30, 1853 by James Gadsden who was the American ambassador to Mexico at that time. It was then ratified, with changes, by the U.S. Senate on April 25, 1854, and signed by 14th President Franklin Pierce, with final approval action taken by Mexico's government and their General Congress or Congress of the Union on June 8, 1854.

14th Amendment - Constitutional amendment that extended civil rights to freedmen and prohibited states from taking away such rights without due process. -Overrode the Dred Scott case decision -Amendment allowed people like Fredrick Douglas to be free

-In 1868, the 14th Amendment to the Constitution of the United States granted citizenship and equal civil and legal rights to African Americans and slaves who had been emancipated after the American Civil War, including them under the umbrella phrase "all persons born or naturalized in the United States."

Alamo -Fortress in Texas where two hundred American volunteers were slain by Santa Anna in 1836. "Remember the Alamo" became a battle cry in support of Texan independence.

-In December 1835, during Texas' war for independence from Mexico, a group of Texan volunteer soldiers occupied the Alamo, a former Franciscan mission located near the present-day city of San Antonio. On February 23, 1836, a Mexican force numbering in the thousands and led by General Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna began a siege of the fort. Though vastly outnumbered, the Alamo's 200 defenders-commanded by James Bowie and William Travis and including the famed frontiersman Davy Crockett-held out courageously for 13 days before the Mexican invaders finally overpowered them. For Texans, the Battle of the Alamo became an enduring symbol of their heroic resistance to oppression and their struggle for independence, which they won later that year.

Gettysburg Address -Abraham Lincoln's oft-quoted speech, delivered at the dedication of the cemetery at Gettysburg battlefield. In the address, Lincoln framed the war as a means to uphold the values of liberty. -completed writing and revising the address that night (November 18), after talking with Secretary of State William H. Seward, who had accompanied him to Gettysburg.

-In November 1863, President Abraham Lincoln was invited to deliver remarks, which later became known as the Gettysburg Address, at the official dedication ceremony for the National Cemetery of Gettysburg in Pennsylvania, on the site of one of the bloodiest and most decisive battles of the Civil War. Though he was not the featured orator that day, Lincoln's 273-word address would be remembered as one of the most important speeches in American history. In it, he invoked the principles of human equality contained in the Declaration of Independence and connected the sacrifices of the Civil War with the desire for "a new birth of freedom," as well as the all-important preservation of the Union created in 1776 and its ideal of self-government.

Harpers Ferry Raid - Federal arsenal in Virginia seized by abolitionist John Brown in 1859. Though Brown was later captured and executed, his raid alarmed southerners, who believed that northerners shared in Brown's extremism. -Author Henry David Thoreau was among those who spoke out in defense of John Brown after his arrest following the Harpers Ferry raid. Thoreau penned an essay, "A Plea for Captain John Brown," in support of his fellow abolitionist.

-In October 1859, the U.S. military arsenal at Harpers Ferry was the target of an assault by an armed band of abolitionists led by John Brown (1800-59). The raid was intended to be the first stage in an elaborate plan to establish an independent stronghold of freed slaves in the mountains of Maryland and Virginia. Brown was captured during the raid and later convicted of treason and hanged, but the raid inflamed white Southern fears of slave rebellions and increased the mounting tension between Northern and Southern states before the American Civil War

Underground Railroad -Informal network of volunteers that helped runaway slaves escape from the South and reach free-soil Canada. Seeking to halt the flow of runaway slaves to the North, southern planters and congressmen pushed for a stronger fugitive slave law. -Harriet Beecher Stowe, famous for her novel Uncle Tom's Cabin, gained firsthand knowledge of the plight of fugitive slaves through contacts with the Underground Railroad in Cincinnati, Ohio.

-It got its name because its activities had to be carried out in secret, using darkness or disguise, and because railway terms were used by those involved with system to describe how it worked. Various routes were lines, stopping places were called stations, those who aided along the way were conductors and their charges were known as packages or freight. The network of routes extended through 14 Northern states and "the promised land" of Canada-beyond the reach of fugitive-slave hunters. Those who most actively assisted slaves to escape by way of the "railroad" were members of the free black community (including former slaves like Harriet Tubman), Northern abolitionists, philanthropists and church leaders like Quaker Thomas Garrett.

Jefferson Davis - U.S. senator from Mississippi and president of the Confederate States of America. A West Point graduate, Davis staunchly defended slavery and Southern rights throughout his career, but he initially opposed secession in 1860. As president of the Confederacy, Davis faced the formidable task of overcoming Southern localism in directing his war effort. After the war, Davis was briefly imprisoned but was pardoned by Andrew Johnson in 1868. -The Confederate president protected incompetents, such as Braxton Bragg, and he did not make use of talented men he disliked, such as Joseph E. Johnston.

-Jefferson Davis (1808-1889) was a Mexican War hero, U.S. senator from Mississippi, U.S. secretary of war and president of the Confederate States of America for the duration of the American Civil War (1861-1865). Prior to the start of the war, Davis had argued against secession, but when Mississippi seceded he resigned from the U.S. Senate. In February 1861 he was elected president of the Confederacy. Davis faced difficulties throughout the war as he struggled to manage the Southern war effort, maintain control the Confederate economy and keep a new nation united.

Sharecropping - An agricultural system that emerged after the Civil War in which black and white farmers rented land and residences from a plantation owner in exchange for giving him a certain "share" of each year's crop. Sharecropping was the dominant form of southern agriculture after the Civil War, and landowners manipulated this system to keep tenants in perpetual debt and unable to leave their plantations. -President Andrew Johnson ordered all land under federal control to be returned to its previous owners in the summer of 1865.

-Many former slaves expected the federal government to give them a certain amount of land as compensation for all the work they had done during the slavery era. Union General William T. Sherman had encouraged this expectation in early 1865 by granting a number of freed men 40 acres each of the abandoned land left in the wake of his army. During Reconstruction, however, the conflict over labor resulted in the sharecropping system, in which black families would rent small plots of land in return for a portion of their crop, to be given to the landowner at the end of each year.

Mexican Cession -historical name for the region of the present day southwestern United States that was ceded to the U.S. by Mexico in 1848 under the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo following the Mexican-American War. this massive land grab was significant because the question of extending slavery into newly acquired territories had become the leading national political issue.

-Nicholas Trist forced the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, explicitly redefining the border between Mexico and the United States, in early 1848 after President Polk had already attempted to recall him from Mexico as a failure.

Lincoln's Assassination -John Wilkes Booth masterminded the simultaneous assassination of Lincoln, Vice President Andrew Johnson and Secretary of State William H. Seward.

-On April 14, 1865, John Wilkes Booth, a famous actor and Confederate sympathizer, fatally shot President Abraham Lincoln at a play at Ford's Theatre in Washington, D.C. The attack came only five days after Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrendered his massive army at Appomattox Court House, Virginia, effectively ending the American Civil War.

Appomattox Court House - Site where Robert E. Lee surrendered to Ulysses S. Grant in April 1865 after almost a year of brutal fighting throughout Virginia in the "Wilderness Campaign."

-On April 9, 1865, Confederate General Robert E. Lee (1807-70) surrendered his approximately 28,000 troops to Union General Ulysses S. Grant (1822-85) in the front parlor of Wilmer McLean's home in Appomattox Court House, Virginia, effectively ending the American Civil War (1861-65). Days earlier, Lee had abandoned the Confederate capital of Richmond and city of Petersburg, hoping to escape with the remnants of his Army of Northern Virginia, meet up with additional Confederate forces in North Carolina and resume fighting. When Union forces cut off his final retreat, Lee was forced to surrender, finally ending four years of bloody sectional conflict.

Emancipation Proclamation - Declared all slaves in rebelling states to be free but did not affect slavery in nonrebelling Border States. The proclamation closed the door on possible compromise with the South and encouraged thousands of Southern slaves to flee to Union lines. -Secretary of State William H. Seward persuaded Lincoln to withhold the proclamation until a major Union military victory could give it added force.

-On September 22, soon after the Union victory at Antietam, Lincoln issued a preliminary Emancipation Proclamation, declaring that as of January 1, 1863, all slaves in the rebellious states "shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free." While the Emancipation Proclamation did not free a single slave, it was an important turning point in the war, transforming the fight to preserve the nation into a battle for human freedom.

"Fifty-four,Forty or Fight" - Slogan adopted by mid-nineteenth-century expansionists who advocated the occupation of Oregon Territory, jointly held by Britain and the United States. Though President Polk had pledged to seize all of Oregon, to 54° 40', he settled on the forty-ninth parallel as a compromise with the British.

-Polk called for expansion that included Texas, California, and the entire Oregon territory. The northern boundary of Oregon was the latitude line of 54 degrees, 40 minutes. "Fifty-four forty or fight!" was the popular slogan that led Polk to victory against all odds. -Henry Clay was nominated against Polk in the election of 1844 but Polks popular slogan helped him win

Popular Sovereignty -Notion advanced before the Civil War that the sovereign people of a given territory should decide whether to allow slavery. Seemingly a compromise, it was largely opposed by northern abolitionists, who feared it would promote the spread of slavery to the territories.

-Popular sovereignty or the sovereignty of the people is the principle that the authority of a state and its government is created and sustained by the consent of its people, through their elected representatives (Rule by the People), who are the source of all political power. It is closely associated with social contract philosophers such as Thomas Hobbes, John Locke and Jean-Jacques Rousseau. The people have the final say in government decisions. Benjamin Franklin expressed the concept when he wrote, "In free governments, the rulers are the servants and the people their superiors and sovereigns".

Southern Secession -On December 20, 1860 South Carolina secede from the Union thinking the "sectional party" picked a president who was harmful to slavery. Febuary 1, 1861 there were seven states that had seceded the Union; S Carolina, AL, Missi, FL, Georgia, Louisiana, and TX. The upper south-Virginia, N Carolina, Tennesee, and Arkansas- did not believe Lincoln's presidency was reason for seceding. Upper South still had strong Union views. Febuary 4, Delegates met in Montgomery Alabama to establish Confederate States of America. They abolished Atlantic slave trade, 3/5 Rule, and free states from enetering Confederacy.

-Secession, as it applies to the outbreak of the American Civil War, comprises the series of events that began on December 20, 1860, and extended through June 8 of the next year when eleven states in the Lower and Upper South severed their ties with the Union. The first seven seceding states of the Lower South set up a provisional government at Montgomery, Alabama. After hostilities began at Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor on April 12, 1861, the border states of Virginia, Arkansas, Tennessee, and North Carolina joined the new government, which then moved its capital to Richmond, Virginia. -Any federal republic by its very nature invited challenge to central control, a danger that James Madison recognized.

Homestead Act (1862) -A federal law that gave settlers 160 acres of land for about $30 if they lived on it for five years and improved it by, for instance, building a house on it. The act helped make land accessible to hundreds of thousands of westward-moving settlers, but many people also found disappointment when their land was infertile or they saw speculators grabbing up the best land. -A homestead bill passed the House in 1858 but was defeated by one vote in the Senate; the next year, a similar bill passed both houses but was vetoed by President James Buchanan.

-Signed into law in May 1862, the Homestead Act opened up settlement in the western United States, allowing any American, including freed slaves, to put in a claim for up to 160 free acres of federal land. By the end of the Civil War, 15,000 homestead claims had been established, and more followed in the postwar years. Eventually, 1.6 million individual claims would be approved; nearly ten percent of all government held property for a total of 420,000 square miles of territory. --the bill passed and was signed into law by President Abraham Lincoln (May 20, 1862). Daniel Freeman became the first person to file a claim under the new act.

Crittenden Compromise -The first of compromise proposals submitted in hopes to prevent a civil war. This one was first submitted by Senator John J. Crittenden of Kentucky. This plan was a proposal to reestablish the Missouri Compromise line and extend it westward to the Pacific coast. Slavery would be prohibited north or the line and permitted south of the line. Southerners in the Senate were willing to accept this plan, but the compromise would have required the northerners to abandon their most fundamental position-that slavery should not be allowed to expand- and so they rejected it.

-The "Crittenden Compromise," as it became known, included six proposed constitutional amendments and four proposed Congressional resolutions that Crittenden hoped would appease Southern states and help the nation avoid civil war. The compromise would have guaranteed the permanent existence of slavery in the slave states by reestablishing the free-slave demarcation line drawn by the 1820 Missouri Compromise. Though Crittenden's plan drew support from Southern leaders, its rejection by many Northern Republicans, including President-elect Abraham Lincon, led to its ultimate failure.

Pacific Railway Act (1862) -Helped fund the construction of the Union Pacific transcontinental railroad with the use of land grants and government bonds. -Signed into law by President Abraham Lincoln on July 1, 1862, the 1862 Act authorized extensive land grants in the Western United States and the issuance of 30-year government bonds

-The "Pacific Railroad Acts" were a series of acts of Congress that promoted the construction of a "transcontinental railroad" (the "Pacific Railroad") in the United States through authorizing the issuance of government bonds and the grants of land to railroad companies. Although the War Department under then Secretary of War Jefferson Davis was authorized by the Congress in 1853 to conduct surveys of five different potential transcontinental routes from the Mississippi ranging from north to south and submitted a massive twelve volume report to Congress with the results in early 1855, no route or bill could be agreed upon and passed authorizing the Government's financial support and land grants until the secession of the Southern states removed their opposition to a central route

15th amendment -prohibited denial of suffrage by states to any citizen on basis of race, color, or previous servitude. enfranchised northern blacks who might vote republican -Hiram Rhoades Revels (1827-1901), a Republican from Natchez, Mississippi, became the first African American ever to sit in the U.S. Congress, when he was elected to the U.S. Senate. -The Voting Rights Act, signed into law by President Lyndon Johnson (1908-73) on August 6, 1965, aimed to overcome legal barriers at the state and local levels that denied African Americans their right to vote under the 15th Amendment.

-The 15th Amendment, granting African-American men the right to vote, was formally adopted into the U.S. Constitution on March 30, 1870. Passed by Congress the year before, the amendment reads: "the right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude." Despite the amendment, by the late 1870s, various discriminatory practices were used to prevent African Americans from exercising their right to vote, especially in the South. After decades of discrimination, the Voting Rights Act of 1965 aimed to overcome legal barriers at the state and local levels that denied blacks their right to vote under the 15th Amendment.

Anaconda Plan -Plan for civil war proposed by general-in-chief Winfield Scott, which emphasized the blockade of Southernp ports and called for an advance down the Mississippi River the cut the South in two, the plan would suffocate the South - Consequently, the Anaconda has been somewhat rehabilitated, and general histories of the Civil War often credit it with guiding President Abraham Lincoln's strategy throughout.

-The Anaconda Plan is the name applied to an outline strategy for suppressing the Confederacy at the beginning of the American Civil War.Proposed by General-in-Chief Winfield Scott, the plan emphasized the blockade of the Southern ports, and called for an advance down the Mississippi River to cut the South in two. Because the blockade would be rather passive, it was widely derided by the vociferous faction who wanted a more vigorous prosecution of the war, and who likened it to the coils of an anaconda suffocating its victim.

Civil Rights Act of 1866 -An act declaring that everyone born in the U.S. is a citizen, regardless of race, color, or previous condition of slavery -It overrode the decision in the Dred Scott case and was the basis for the Fourteenth Amendment.

-The Civil Rights Act of 1866, enacted April 9, 1866, was the first United States federal law to define US citizenship and affirm that all citizens are equally protected by the law. It was mainly intended to protect the civil rights of Africans born in or brought to America, in the wake of the American Civil War. This legislation was enacted by Congress in 1865 but vetoed by President Andrew Johnson. In April 1866 Congress again passed the bill. Although Johnson again vetoed it, a two-thirds majority in each house overcame the veto and the bill therefore became law.

Civil Rights Act of 1875 -The last piece of federal civil rights legislation until the 1950s, the law promised blacks equal access to public accommodations and banned racism in jury selection, but it provided no means of enforcement and was therefore ineffective. In 1883, the Supreme Court declared most of the act unconstitutional. -The drafting of the bill was performed early in 1870 by Senator Charles Sumner, a dominant Radical Republican in the Senate, with the assistance of John Mercer Langston, a prominent African American who established the law department at Howard University.

-The Civil Rights Act of 1875 (18 Stat. 335-337),[2] sometimes called Enforcement Act or Force Act, was a United States federal law enacted during the Reconstruction Era to guarantee African Americans equal treatment in public accommodations, public transportation, and to prohibit exclusion from jury service. The bill was passed by the 43rd United States Congress and signed into law by President Ulysses S. Grant on March 1, 1875. Several years later, the Supreme Court ruled in Civil Rights Cases (1883) that sections of the act were unconstitutional.

Compromise of 1877 -The agreement that finally resolved the 1876 election and officially ended Reconstruction. In exchange for the Republican candidate, Rutherford B. Hayes, winning the presidency, Hayes agreed to withdraw the last of the federal troops from the former Confederate states. This deal effectively completed the southern return to white-only, Democratic-dominated electoral politics.

-The Compromise of 1877 was a purported informal, unwritten deal that settled the intensely disputed 1876 U.S. presidential election, pulled federal troops out of state politics in the South, and ended the Reconstruction Era. Through the Compromise, Republican Rutherford B. Hayes was awarded the White House over Democrat Samuel J. Tilden on the understanding that Hayes would remove the federal troops whose support was essential for the survival of Republican state governments in South Carolina, Florida and Louisiana. The compromise involved Democrats who controlled the House of Representatives allowing the decision of the Electoral Commission to take effect. The outgoing president, Republican Ulysses S. Grant, removed the soldiers from Florida.

Credit Mobilier - A construction company was formed by owners of the Union Pacific Railroad for the purpose of receiving government contracts to build the railroad at highly inflated prices-and profits. In 1872 a scandal erupted when journalists discovered that the Crédit Mobilier Company had bribed congressmen and even the vice president to allow the ruse to continue. -Speaker of the House James G. Blaine, a Maine Republican implicated in the scandal, set up a congressional committee to investigate. -The House censured two of its members who were involved in the scandal: Oakes Ames of Massachusetts and James Brooks of New York.

-The Crédit Mobilier scandal of 1872-1873 damaged the careers of several Gilded Age politicians. Major stockholders in the Union Pacific Railroad formed a company, the Crédit Mobilier of America, and gave it contracts to build the railroad. They sold or gave shares in this construction to influential congressmen.It was a lucrative deal for the congressmen, because they helped themselves by approving federal subsidies for the cost of railroad construction without paying much attention to expenses, enabling railroad builders to make huge profits.

Free-Soil Party -Antislavery party in the 1848 and 1852 elections that opposed the extension of slavery into the territories, arguing that the presence of slavery would limit opportunities for free laborers. -some notable free spoilers were Martin Van Buren and John P. Hale

-The Free Soil Party was a short-lived political party in the United States active in the 1848 and 1852 presidential elections, and in some state elections. Founded in Buffalo, New York, it was a third party and a single-issue party that largely appealed to and drew its greatest strength from New York State. The party leadership consisted of former anti-slavery members of the Whig Party and the Democratic Party. Its main purpose was opposing the expansion of slavery into the western territories, arguing that free men on free soil comprised a morally and economically superior system to slavery.

Freeport Doctrine - Declared that since slavery could not exist without laws to protect it, territorial legislatures, not the Supreme Court, would have the final say on the slavery question. First argued by Stephen Douglas in 1858 in response to Abraham Lincoln's "Freeport question."

-The Freeport Doctrine was articulated by Stephen A. Douglas at the second of the Lincoln-Douglas debates on August 27, 1858, in Freeport, Illinois. Abraham Lincoln was campaigning to take Douglas' U.S. Senate seat by strongly opposing all attempts to expand the geographic area in which slavery was practiced. Lincoln tried to force Douglas to choose between the principle of popular sovereignty proposed by the Kansas-Nebraska Act (which left the fate of slavery in a U.S. territory up to its inhabitants), and the majority decision of the United States Supreme Court in the case of Dred Scott v. Sandford, which stated that slavery could not legally be excluded from U.S. territories

Kansas-Nebraska Act (1854) -Proposed that the issue of slavery be decided by popular sovereignty in the Kansas and Nebraska Territories, thus revoking the 1820 Missouri Compromise. Introduced by Stephen Douglas in an effort to bring Nebraska into the Union and pave the way for a northern transcontinental railroad. -President Franklin Pierce gave Douglas and his southern allies his support.

-The Kansas-Nebrask Act was an 1854 bill that mandated "popular sovereignty"-allowing settlers of a territory to decide whether slavery would be allowed within a new state's borders. Proposed by Stephen A. Douglas-Abraham Lincoln's opponent in the influential Lincoln-Douglas debates-the bill overturned the Missouri Compromise's use of latitude as the boundary between slave and free territory. The conflicts that arose between pro-slavery and anti-slavery settlers in the aftermath of the act's passage led to the period of violence known as Bleeding Kansas, and helped paved the way for the American Civil War (1861-65).

Monitor vs. Merrimac -Monitor vs. Merrimack was the first engagement ever between two iron-clad naval vessels. The two ships battled in a portion of the Chesapeake Bay known as Hampton Roads for five hours on March 9, 1862, ending in a draw

-The March 9, 1862, battle between the Monitor and the Merrimack (CSS Virginia) during the American Civil War (1861-65) was history's first duel between ironclad warships. The engagement, known as the Battle of Hampton Roads, was part of a Confederate effort to break the Union blockade of Southern ports, including Norfolk and Richmond, Virginia, that had been imposed at the start of the war. Though the battle itself was inconclusive, it began a new era in naval warfare.

Mexican-American War -(1846-1848) Conflict after US annexation of Texas; Mexico still considered Texas its own; Victor: US; granted all land from Texas to California (minus the Gadsden Purchase) in the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo -Santa Anna resigned, and the United States waited for a new government capable of negotiations to form. Finally, on Feb. 2, 1848, the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo was signed, establishing the Rio Grande and not the Nueces River as the U.S.-Mexican border

-The Mexican-American War (1846-1848) marked the first U.S. armed conflict chiefly fought on foreign soil. It pitted a politically divided and militarily unprepared Mexico against the expansionist-minded administration of U.S. President James K. Polk, who believed the United States had a "manifest destiny" to spread across the continent to the Pacific Ocean. A border skirmish along the Rio Grande started off the fighting and was followed by a series of U.S. victories. When the dust cleared, Mexico had lost about one-third of its territory, including nearly all of present-day California, Utah, Nevada, Arizona and New Mexico.

Morrill Tariff Act (1861) -increased duties back up to 1846 levels to raise revenue for the Civil War. -It was named for its sponsor, Representative Justin Smith Morrill of Vermont, who drafted it with the advice of Pennsylvania economist Henry Charles Carey. The passage of the tariff was possible because many tariff-averse Southerners had resigned from Congress after their states declared their secession.

-The Morrill Tariff of 1861 was an increased tariff in the United States, adopted on March 2, 1861, during the administration of President James Buchanan, a Democrat. It was a key element of the platform of the new Republican Party, and it appealed to industrialists and factory workers as a way to foster rapid industrial growth by limiting competition from lower-wage industries in Europe.The Morrill Tariff raised rates to encourage industry and to foster high wages for industrial workers.

Radical Republicans -wanted to democratize the South, establish public education, and ensure the rights or free people; strongly promoted free blacks and black suffrage -Congressional group that wished to punish the South for its secession from the Union; pushed for measures that gave economic and political rights to newly freed blacks in the South and that made it difficult for former Confederate states to rejoin the Union. -They bitterly fought President Andrew Johnson

-The Radical Republicans were a faction of American politicians within the Republican Party from about 1854 (before the American Civil War) until the end of Reconstruction in 1877. They called themselves "Radicals" and were opposed during the war by the Moderate Republicans (led by Abraham Lincoln), by the Conservative Republicans, and by the pro-slavery Democratic Party. After the war, the Radicals were opposed by self-styled "conservatives" (in the South) and "liberals" (in the North). Radicals strongly opposed slavery during the war and after the war distrusted ex-Confederates, demanding harsh policies for the former rebels, and emphasizing civil rights and voting rights for freedmen (recently freed slaves)

Republican Party -political party formed in 1854 in response to the Kansas-Nebraska Act; it combined remnants of Whig, Free Soil, and Know-Nothing Parties as well as disgruntled Democrats. Although not abolitionist, it sought to block the spread of slavery in the territories. It also favored tariffs, homesteads, and a transcontinental railroad.

-The Republicans rapidly gained supporters in the North, and in 1856 their first presidential candidate, John C. Fremont, won 11 of the 16 Northern states -By 1876, the Republican Party had lost control of the South, but it continued to dominate the presidency until the election of Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1933.

Treaty of Guadalupe-Hidalgo (1848) - Ended the war with Mexico. Mexico agreed to cede territory reaching northwest from Texas to Oregon in exchange for $18.25 million in cash and assumed debts. -Nicholas P. Trist (1800-1874) American diplomat who negotiated the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo in 1848 -the U.S. Congress voted in favor of President James Polk's request to declare war on Mexico ina dispute over Texas.

-The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, signed on February 2, 1848, ended the Mexican-American War in favor of the United States. The war had begun almost two years earlier, in May 1846, over a territorial dispute involving Texas. The treaty added an additional 525,000 square miles to United States territory, including the including the land that makes up all or parts of present-day Arizona, California, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming. Mexico also gave up all claims to Texas and recognized the Rio Grande as America's southern boundary.

Freedman's Bureau -Created to aid newly emancipated slaves by providing food, clothing, medical care, education, and legal support. Its achievements were uneven and depended largely on the quality of local administrators. - Another leading opponent was President Andrew Johnson -"There was no tradition of government responsibility for a huge refugee population and no bureaucracy to administer a large welfare, employment and land reform program," according to "The Freedmen's Bureau and Reconstruction," edited by Paul Cimbala and Randall Miller.

-The U.S. Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen and Abandoned Lands, popularly known as the Freedmen's Bureau, was established in 1865 by Congress to help former black slaves and poor whites in the South in the aftermath of the U.S. Civil War (1861-65). Some 4 million slaves gained their freedom as a result of the Union victory in the war, which left many communities in ruins and destroyed the South's plantation-based economy. The Freedmen's Bureau provided food, housing and medical aid, established schools and offered legal assistance. It also attempted to settle former slaves on Confederate lands confiscated or abandoned during the war.

Wade-Davis Bill (1864) - Passed by congressional Republicans in response to Abraham Lincoln's "10 percent" Reconstruction plan, it required that 50 percent of a state's voters pledge allegiance to the Union, and set stronger safeguards for emancipation. Reflected divisions between Congress and the president, and between radical and moderate Republicans, over the treatment of the defeated South.

-The Wade-Davis Bill of 1864 was a bill proposed for the Reconstruction of the South written by two Radical Republicans, Senator Benjamin Wade of Ohio and Representative Henry Winter Davis of Maryland. In contrast to President Abraham Lincoln's more lenient Ten Percent Plan, the bill made re-admittance to the Union for former Confederate states contingent on a majority in each Southern state to take the Ironclad oath to the effect they had never in the past supported the Confederacy.

Wilmot Provisio -Amendment that sought to prohibit slavery from territories acquired from Mexico. Introduced by Pennsylvania congressman David Wilmot, the failed amendment ratcheted up tensions between North and South over the issue of slavery.

-The Wilmot Proviso was designed to eliminate slavery within the land acquired as a result of the Mexican War (1846-48). Soon after the war began, President James K. Polk sought the appropriation of $2 million as part of a bill to negotiate the terms of a treaty. Fearing the addition of a pro-slave territory, Pennsylvania Congressman David Wilmot proposed his amendment to the bill. Although the measure was blocked in the southern-dominated Senate, it enflamed the growing controversy over slavery, and its underlying principle helped bring about the formation of the Republican Party in 1854.

Border States -Five slave states—Missouri, Kentucky, Maryland, Delaware, and West Virginia—that did not secede during the Civil War. To keep the states in the Union, Abraham Lincoln insisted that the war was not about abolishing slavery but rather protecting the Union. -Abrahan Lincoln had a strong desire to keep the border states part of the union -Kentucky Governor Beriah Magoffin proposed that slave states such as like Kentucky should conform to the US Constitution, and remain in the Union.

-The border slave states of Maryland, Delaware, Kentucky, and Missouri remained with the Union, although they all contributed volunteers to the Confederacy. Fifty counties of western Virginia were loyal to the Union government, and in 1863 this area was constituted the separate state of West Virginia.

Dred Scott v. Sandford - Supreme Court decision that extended federal protection to slavery by ruling that Congress did not have the power to prohibit slavery in any territory. Also declared that slaves, as property, were not citizens of the United States.

-The case had been brought before the court by Dred Scott, a slave who had lived with his owner in a free state before returning to the slave state of Missouri. Scott argued that his time spent in these locations entitled him to emancipation. In his decision, Chief Justice Roger B. Taney, a staunch supporter of slavery, disagreed: The court found that no black, free or slave, could claim U.S. citizenship, and therefore blacks were unable to petition the court for their freedom. The Dred Scott decision incensed abolitionists and heightened North-South tensions, which would erupt in war just three years later

Mining Frontier -The discovery of gold in CA in 1848 caused the first flood of newcomers to the West. A series of gold strikes and silver strikes in what became the states of Colorado, Nevada, Idaho, Montana, Arizona, and South Dakota kept a steady flow of hopeful young prospectors pushing into the Western mountains.

-The discovery of gold in California in 1848 did more than trigger the migration of tens of thousands of people hoping to make their fortune in the mineral‐rich West. It created a body of prospectors willing to go wherever a strike was made. When gold was found in British Columbia in 1857, prospectors streamed north into Canada. -In 1859, two young prospectors struck gold in the Sierra Nevada. Suddenly, another miner, Henry Comstock, appeared. "The land is mine," he cried, and demanded to be made a partner. From then on, Comstock boasted about "his" mine. The strike became known as the Comstock Lode. A lode is a rich vein of gold or silver.

Gold Rush -Inflow of thousands of miners to northern California after news reports of the discovery of gold at Sutter's Mill in January of 1848 had spread around the world by the end of that year. The onslaught of migrants prompted Californians to organize a government and apply for statehood in 1849. - James Wilson Marshall, a carpenter originally from New Jersey, found flakes of gold in the American River at the base of the Sierra Nevada Mountains near Coloma, California. At the time, Marshall was working to build a water-powered sawmill owned by John Sutter, a German-born Swiss citizen and founder of a colony of Nueva Helvetia

-The discovery of gold nuggets in the Sacramento Valley in early 1848 sparked the Gold Rush, arguably one of the most significant events to shape American history during the first half of the 19th century. As news spread of the discovery, thousands of prospective gold miners traveled by sea or over land to San Francisco and the surrounding area; by the end of 1849, the non-native population of the California territory was some 100,000 (compared with the pre-1848 figure of less than 1,000). A total of $2 billion worth of precious metal was extracted from the area during the Gold Rush, which peaked in 1852.

Election of 1860 -Republican - Abraham Lincoln. Democrat - Stephan A. Douglas, John C. Breckenridge. Constitutional Union - John Bell. Issues were slavery in the territories (Lincoln opposed adding any new slave states).

-The election was held on Tuesday, November 6, 1860, and served as the immediate impetus for the outbreak of the American Civil War. The United States had been divided during the 1850s on questions surrounding the expansion of slavery and the rights of slave owners. In 1860, these issues broke the Democratic Party into Northern and Southern factions, and a new Constitutional Union Party appeared. In the face of a divided opposition, the Republican Party, dominant in the North, secured a majority of the electoral votes, putting Abraham Lincoln in the White House with almost no support from the South. Before Lincoln's inauguration, seven Southern states declared their secession and formed the Confederacy.

Thomas Nast -A famous caricaturist and editorial cartoonist in the 19th century and is considered to be the father of American political cartooning. His artwork was primarily based on political corruption. He helped people realize the corruption of some politicians

-Thomas Nast (September 27, 1840 - December 7, 1902) was a German-born American caricaturist and editorial cartoonist considered to be the "Father of the American Cartoon".[1] He was the scourge of Democratic Representative "Boss" Tweed and the Tammany Hall Democratic party political machine. Among his notable works were the creation of the modern version of Santa Claus and the political symbol of the elephant for the Republican Party.

William "Boss" Tweed -Tweed Ring A symbol of Gilded Age corruption, "Boss" Tweed and his deputies ran the New York City Democratic party in the 1860s and swindled $200 million from the city through bribery, graft, and vote-buying. Boss Tweed was eventually jailed for his crimes and died behind bars.

-Tweed became a powerful figure in Tammany Hall-New York City's Democratic political machine-in the late 1850s. By the mid 1860s, he had risen to the top position in the organization and formed the "Tweed Ring," which openly bought votes, encouraged judicial corruption, extracted millions from city contracts, and dominated New York City politics. The Tweed Ring reached its peak of fraudulence in 1871 with the remodeling of the City Court House, a blatant embezzlement of city funds that was exposed by The New York Times. Tweed and his flunkies hoped the criticism would blow over, but thanks to the efforts of opponents such as Harper's Weekly political cartoonist Thomas Nast, who conducted a crusade against Tweed, virtually every Tammany Hall member was swept from power in the elections of November 1871.

Black Codes - Laws passed throughout the South to restrict the rights of emancipated blacks, particularly with respect to negotiating labor contracts. Increased Northerners' criticisms of President Andrew Johnson's lenient Reconstruction policies. -This period was the start of the convict lease system, also described as "slavery by another name" by Douglas Blackmon

-Under the lenient Reconstruction policies of President Andrew Johnson, white southerners reestablished civil authority in the former Confederate states in 1865 and 1866. They enacted a series of restrictive laws known as "black codes," which were designed to restrict freed blacks' activity and ensure their availability as a labor force now that slavery had been abolished. For instance, many states required blacks to sign yearly labor contracts; if they refused, they risked being arrested as vagrants and fined or forced into unpaid labor. Northern outrage over the black codes helped undermine support for Johnson's policies, and by late 1866 control over Reconstruction had shifted to the more radical wing of the Republican Party in Congress.

Presidential Reconstruction -The Reconstruction plans of Lincoln and Johnson who believed it was the executive's power to rebuild the South. It was the first "round" of the Reconstruction, from 1863 to the spring of 1866.

-Upon Lincoln's assassination in April 1865, Andrew Johnson of Tennessee, who had been elected with Lincoln in 1864 as vice president, became president. Johnson rejected the Radical program of Reconstruction and instead appointed his own governors and tried to finish reconstruction by the end of 1865.

Great American Desert -used in the 19th century to describe the western part of the Great Plains east of the Rocky Mountains in North America to about the 100th meridian. The area is now usually referred to as the High Plains, and the original term is now sometimes used to describe the arid region of North America, which includes parts of northwestern Mexico and the American southwest.

-When the region was obtained by the United States as part of the Louisiana Purchase in 1803, President Jefferson wrote of the "immense and trackless deserts" of the region. - In 1823, Major Stephen Long, a government surveyor and leader of the next official exploration expedition, produced a map labeling the area the Great American Desert.

Impending Crisis of the South -book entitled 'Impending Crisis of the South' by Hinton R. Helper that stirred trouble. Attempted to prove that indirectly the non-slave holding whites were the ones who suffered the most from slavery; the book was banned in the South but countless copies were distributed as campaign material for republicans

-a book written by Hinton Rowan Helper of North Carolina, which he self-published in New York, 1857. It was a strong attack on slavery as inefficient and a barrier to the economic advancement of whites. The book was widely distributed by Horace Greeley and other antislavery leaders, and infuriated Southern leaders.

Fugitive Slave Law -Passed as part of the Compromise of 1850, it set high penalties for anyone who aided escaped slaves and compelled all law enforcement officers to participate in retrieving runaways. Strengthened the antislavery cause in the North. - Part of Henry Clay's famed Compromise of 1850—a group of bills that helped quiet early calls for Southern secession—this new law forcibly compelled citizens to assist in the capture of runaway slaves. -Harriet Tubman assisted in the "underground railroad" which helped slaves escape

-a pair of federal laws that allowed for the capture and return of runaway slaves within the territory of the United States. Enacted by Congress in 1793, the first Fugitive Slave Act authorized local governments to seize and return escaped slaves to their owners and imposed penalties on anyone who aided in their flight. Widespread resistance to the 1793 law later led to the passage of the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850, which added further provisions regarding runaways and levied even harsher punishments for interfering in their capture.

manifest destiny -Belief that the United States was destined by God to spread its "empire of liberty" across North America. Served as a justification for mid-nineteenth-century expansionism. -By 1843 John Quincy Adams, originally a major supporter of the concept underlying manifest destiny, had changed his mind and repudiated expansionism because it meant the expansion of slavery in Texas

-a term for the attitude prevalent during the 19th century period of American expansion that the United States not only could, but was destined to, stretch from coast to coast. This attitude helped fuel western settlement, Native American removal and war with Mexico. - The phrase was first employed by John L. O'Sullivan in an article on the annexation of Texas published in the July-August 1845 edition of the United States Magazine and Democratic Review, which he edited.

Force Acts (1870, 1871) -Passed by Congress following a wave of Ku Klux Klan violence, the acts banned clan membership, prohibited the use of intimidation to prevent blacks from voting, and gave the U.S. military the authority to enforce the acts. -The first proposed bill was submitted to the Senate in February 1870 by Sen. George F. Edmunds from Vermont followed by Sen. Oliver P. Morton from Indiana, Sen. Charles Sumner from Massachusetts, and Sen. William Stewart from Nevada. -The act was passed by Congress in May 1870 and signed into law by President Ulysses S. Grant on May 31, 1870.

-he Enforcement Act of 1870, also known as the Civil Rights Act of 1870 or First Ku Klux Klan Act, or Force Act was a United States federal law written to empower the President with the legal authority to enforce the first section of the Fifteenth Amendment throughout the United States. The act was the first of three Enforcement Acts passed by the United States Congress from 1870 to 1871 during the Reconstruction Era to combat attacks on the suffrage rights of African Americans from state officials or violent groups like the Ku Klux Klan.

13th Amendment -Constitutional amendment prohibiting all forms of slavery and involuntary servitude. Former Confederate states were required to ratify the amendment prior to gaining reentry into the Union. -Lincoln believed that a constitutional amendment was necessary to ensure the end of slavery. -On December 18, 1865, Secretary of State William H. Seward proclaimed its adoption.

-in 1865, the 13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, officially ending the institution of slavery, is ratified. "Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction." With these words, the single greatest change wrought by the Civil War was officially noted in theConstitution.

Webster-Ashburton Treaty (1842) -signed August 9, 1842, was a treaty resolving several border issues between the United States and the British North American colonies, particularly a dispute over the location of the Maine-New Brunswick border. Also banned the slave trade (on the ocean)

-signed August 9, 1842, was a treaty resolving several border issues between the United States and the British North American colonies. Signed under John Tyler's presidency, it resolved the Aroostook War, a nonviolent dispute over the location of the Maine-New Brunswick border. It established the border between Lake Superior and the Lake of the Woods, originally defined in the Treaty of Paris -The treaty was signed by United States Secretary of State Daniel Webster and British diplomat Alexander Baring, 1st Baron Ashburton.

New England Emigrant Aid Company -Organization created to facilitate the migration of free laborers to Kansas in order to prevent the establishment of slavery in the territory. -His primary partners in the venture were Alexander H. Bullock and Edward Everett Hale, and together they set Thayer's plans in motion on March 5, 1854.

-was a transportation company in Boston, Massachusetts, created to transport immigrants to the Kansas Territory to shift the balance of power so that Kansas would enter the United States as a free state rather than a slave state. Created by Eli Thayer in the wake of the Kansas-Nebraska Act, which allowed the population of Kansas Territory to choose whether slavery would be legal, the Company is noted less for its direct impact than for the psychological impact it had on proslavery and antislavery elements.