Slavery, Abolition & the Road to Civil War

US History

Chapter 5 · Slavery, Abolition & the Road to Civil War

Chapter 2 noted that slavery grew dramatically in the colonial period without giving figures. This chapter picks that up, covers the cotton economy that expanded it further, the compromises Congress used to hold the country together, the abolitionist movement, and the sequence of events that led to secession and Fort Sumter. The war itself belongs to Military History: The US Civil War, planned but not yet written. The sources are three reference articles, on slavery in the United States, on abolitionism, and on the origins of the Civil War, plus two shorter checks on cotton and the Missouri Compromise. One of the main sources gave little usable detail, and the chapter says where that leaves gaps.

Cotton and the Economy

Cotton production expanded dramatically after 1800, reaching "all the way to Texas" with the spread of the cotton gin. One source gives production rising "from 750,000 bales in 1830 to 2.85 million bales in 1850," nearly a fourfold increase in twenty years. It became the nation's dominant export, fuelling textile industries in Britain, France and the American Northeast.

A Number the Sources Do Not Give The cotton source says plantation owners "enslaved people from Africa and the Caribbean to hoe and harvest the crop," but does not say how many people worked in cotton by the 1850s. The slavery article's own outline promised sections on population and the "Cotton Kingdom," but the summary I received was mostly a table of contents with little content, so I do not have population figures for 1790 or 1860 to report here, and I do not invent them.

Congress Tries to Hold the Balance

By 1819 the Senate was evenly divided, eleven slave states and eleven free states, and each state sent two senators regardless of population. Admitting Missouri as a slave state would have tipped that balance. The Missouri Compromise of 1820 admitted Missouri as a slave state and Maine as a free state together, and prohibited slavery in the remaining Louisiana Purchase territory north of the 36 degrees 30 minutes line.

Delaying, Not Resolving The source says the Compromise "delayed the Civil War" while simultaneously "sow[ing] its seeds." I read that as an acknowledgement that a fixed geographic line could not settle the underlying disagreement, only postpone the next argument over it. That is the source's own hedge, not one I am adding.

Stephen Douglas's Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854 replaced the fixed line with "popular sovereignty," letting territorial settlers decide slavery for themselves, and effectively repealed the Missouri Compromise's restrictions. This triggered "Bleeding Kansas," described as "paramilitary conflict between pro- and anti-slavery supporters." In 1857 the Supreme Court's Dred Scott v. Sandford decision went further, ruling that Congress lacked authority to prohibit slavery in the territories at all, which made even the Missouri Compromise's old line unconstitutional in the Court's own reasoning.

Abolition

The Pennsylvania Abolition Society, formed on 14 April 1775, is described as "the first American abolition society." William Lloyd Garrison and Frederick Douglass "agitated for abolition in the mid-19th century," and John Brown "became an advocate and militia leader in attempting to end slavery by force of arms."

A Thin Source on This Topic I could not find substantive detail on the Underground Railroad's operation, a founding date for the American Anti-Slavery Society, Uncle Tom's Cabin's role, or the divisions between immediate and gradual abolitionists, or between Black and white abolitionists, though the source's own contents page names all of these as covered elsewhere in the article. I also did not find anything on Harriet Tubman in what I read. I report only the names and dates I could confirm, and I list the rest as gaps rather than filling them from general knowledge.

The Road to Secession

Historians agree, according to the origins article, that slavery was central to the conflict, though they disagree about why the North opposed secession. Most scholars identify "preserving slavery as the central reason for the Southern states' decisions to secede," and it quotes Mississippi's own secession document: "Our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery."

ExplanationWhat the source says
SlaveryThe dominant view among modern historians, supported by the states' own secession documents.
Economic conflictThe "Progressive school" of the 1910s to 1940s argued this, but the source says modern historians reject it, quoting economic historian Lee A. Craig: "economic conflict was not an inherent condition of North-South relations...and did not cause the Civil War."
States' rightsThe source says this was "an ideology formulated and applied as a means of advancing slave state interests," not an independent cause.
A Debate the Source Settles More Than Most Unlike some chapters in this course, where the sources leave a dispute open, this one states a clear majority view and explains why two rival explanations are rejected. I follow the source's own weighting rather than presenting all three as equally live, since it says so directly, not because I have independently checked the historiography.

Abraham Lincoln won the 1860 election without appearing "even on the ballot in ten Southern states," running as an opponent of slavery's expansion into the territories. Seven Deep South slave states formed the Confederate States between November 1860 and March 1861. The war began on 12 April 1861, when Confederate forces bombarded Fort Sumter.

What I Did Not Verify I did not find enslaved population figures for 1790 and 1860, the details of the domestic slave trade after the 1808 ban on the international trade, the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850's provisions, the Underground Railroad, or the full abolitionist movement and its internal divisions. I also did not check the cotton bale figures against another source. The chapter stops at Fort Sumter and does not cover the war, which is Military History: The US Civil War's subject once it is written.

Hands-On Exercises

Exercise 1

Explain why the Senate's composition made the Missouri Compromise necessary, and what changed when the Kansas-Nebraska Act replaced it.

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Exercise 2

A student writes "Historians are divided on whether the Civil War was mainly about slavery or states' rights." Use the chapter to correct it.

→ Solution
Exercise 3

List what the chapter's abolition section could and could not confirm, and say what you would need to fill the gaps properly.

→ Solution

Quick Reference

  • Cotton: 750,000 bales (1830) to 2.85 million (1850)
  • Missouri Compromise: 1820; Missouri slave, Maine free; 36 degrees 30 line; repealed in effect by the Kansas-Nebraska Act, 1854
  • Dred Scott: 1857; Congress ruled to lack power to bar slavery in the territories
  • Abolition: Pennsylvania Abolition Society, 1775; Garrison, Douglass, John Brown named
  • Causes of the war: the source names slavery as the dominant scholarly explanation, and reports economic conflict and states' rights as rejected or subordinate explanations
  • Secession: Lincoln elected November 1860; seven states secede by March 1861; Fort Sumter, 12 April 1861
  • Not covered: population figures, the domestic slave trade, the Underground Railroad, the war itself