Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Key People
James Buchanan - 15th U.S. president; supported the Lecompton Constitution to admit Kansas as a slave state Dred Scott - Slave who sued his master for his and his familys freedom in a landmark 1857 Supreme Court case Roger Taney - Chief Justice of the Supreme Court who declared the Missouri Compromise unconstitutional in the Dred Scott v. Sanford decision Stephen Douglas - Illinois senator who rejected Kansass Lecompton Constitution; announced Freeport Doctrine of popular sovereignty during the Lincoln-Douglas debates in 1858 Abraham Lincoln - Former lawyer from Illinois who rose to national prominence during the Lincoln-Douglas debates
Chapter 3
Northern Backlash
The Dred Scott ruling only exacerbated sectional tensions, however. Whereas Southerners hailed it as a landmark decision that would finally bring peace, Northerners were appalled. Thousands in the North took to the streets to protest the decision, and many questioned the impartiality of the Southern-dominated Supreme Court. Several state legislatures essentially nullified the decision and declared that they would never permit slavery within their borders, no matter who ordered them to do so. Buchanan himself was implicated when it was discovered that he had pressured the Northern justice into voting with the Southerners. Arguably, the Dred Scott decision had almost as great an effect on Northern public opinion as Uncle Toms Cabin.
Chapter 3
The Lincoln-Douglas Debates
In this atmosphere of national confusion, relatively unknown former congressman Abraham Lincoln challenged Stephen Douglas to a series of public debates in their home state of Illinois. Lincoln, hoping to steal Douglass seat in the Senate in the 1858 elections, wanted to be the first to put the question of slavery to the voters. The Little Giant accepted and engaged Lincoln in a total of seven debates, each in front of several thousand people. During the debates, Lincoln denounced slavery as a moral wrong and argued that the peculiar institution should be banned from the West permanently. At the same time, though, he also called for the preservation of the Union. Douglas accused Lincoln of being a radical abolitionist and articulated a new policythe Freeport Doctrinestating that popular sovereignty in the territories was the only democratic solution to resolving the slavery problem. Even though Lincoln lost the Senate race, the Lincoln-Douglas debates brought him to national prominence.