History 103 *** AMERICAN HISTORY TO 1877 *** Nov. 22, 1996
SECTIONAL CONFLICT & THE COMPROMISE OF 1850
I. Another Firebell: Wilmot Proviso (continued)
- Northern concerns
- Southern concerns
- Congressional outcome
II. Presidential Election of 1848
- Democrats nominate Lewis Cass on "popular sovereignty"
platform
- Whigs nominate Zachary Taylor on no platform
- Free Soil Party founded
- Free Soilers nominate Van Buren on platform opposing slavery's
expansion
- Taylor wins; Second Party System survives
III. California Gold Rush
- Polk's announcement and popular response (1848-49)
- Exploitation of Chinese; extermination of Native Americans
- Implications for American politics
IV. The Compromise of 1850
- Taylor's plan
- Clay's alternative
- Senate debate
- Taylor dies, Fillmore becomes president
- Stephen Douglas engineers passage of Compromise
V. Controversy over the Fugitive Slave Law
- Southern conventions
- Abolitionist outrage
- Harriet Beecher Stowe writes Uncle Tom's Cabin
(1851-52)
VI. Presidential Election of 1852
- Democrats nominate Franklin Pierce
- Whigs nominate Winfield Scott
- Pierce wins