Posted on 07/01/2016 6:24:15 AM PDT by Homer_J_Simpson
What we now call Oklahoma was for Indians, huh. Would that have worked? All American Indians would be given Oklahoma?
New Month, new thread. I have three excerpts scheduled for July, including one from a new addition to our series. We will also see samples from the July Harper’s Magazine. As usual, timely posts from other sources are appreciated.
Wasn’t there violence in the Kansas area (related to slavery) in about this time that lead to the Missouri Compromise? Forgive me if I have my history backward in this instance.
What is it that we are intended to discuss regarding 1856? Is this to be another Civil War thread?
Yes there was slavery-related violence going on in Kansas from 1855 on. The Missouri Compromise was 1820 and was a major element in the story. The direct cause of the current troubles was the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854, which effectively repealed the Missouri Compromise and made Kansas the focal point in the argument of whether slavery could be extended from where it existed in the southern states (including Missouri) to newly created federal territories.
Dixie Ping
This series covering the events of 160 years ago began at the end of last year (1855). The purpose is to learn about U.S. history leading up to and including the Civil War. I didn't put that in the monthly description appearing in reply #1 of every thread because the war won't start for another five years and I don't want to jinx the plan by promising something that far off. But if all goes well we will be here in April of 1861/2021 when Fort Sumter is bombarded.
Oh. I was unfamiliar with it. So pretty much we need to restrict our discussion to the 1856 and earlier time period?
Okay then.
That might have been the plan, but my knowledge is deficient in that part of our history. No doubt some smart passing stranger can fill us in. If the idea was to move all Indians in U.S. territory to that one central location I think the folks in Washington didn't think it through very well.
I never much kept up with the slavery debate for the territories, but in the last year I have learned of the existence of Article IV Section 2, and as a result I no longer understand why there could have been any debate about it.
With the constitution explicitly guarantying that slaves must be returned to their masters, how does one realistically abolish slavery in the territories, or even in "free" states?
How do you stop slave owners from going into the territories or free states with their slaves?
You’ve got it. The CW was not about the continuation of slavery where it was established, it was about the expansion of slavery into territories and states where it didn’t exist in the particular southern form.
Apparently you don’t know your American history. That is the area given to the tribes who were forced out of the American southeast. Now
Known as The Trail of Tears that forced deportation was and is a stain on the US govt.
This is a map of what was at that time
No hard and fast rules, but that is the general idea. It is okay to relate events of the "current" time to resulting outcomes in the "future." When we had the World War II series going discussion about a few events - I'm thinking of Pearl Harbor and Barbarossa - began years before their 70th anniversaries. Also, as we move along new characters enter the picture who will become more important as time goes on. In 1856 Robert E. Lee was a Lt. Col. in the U.S. Cavalry. I have an excerpt from his biography scheduled for this month. It could be instructive and entertaining to compare the early Lee with the later one.
I don't understand your point. If the Constitution requires a state to return escaped slaves, how are you going to create a "free" state?
I suppose you could pass a law that won't allow anyone born in that state to be a slave, but I don't see how you can do anything about people moving into another state and bringing slaves born elsewhere with them.
I see that as the question that drove the debate on slavery from our founding until the Civil War.
Given that OK has huge oil deposits, yeah..............
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bleeding_Kansas
Bleeding Kansas, Bloody Kansas or the Border War was a series of violent political confrontations in the United States involving anti-slavery “Free-Staters” and pro-slavery “Border Ruffian”, or “southern yankees” elements in Kansas between 1854 and 1861, including “Bleeding Congress”. The Kansas–Nebraska Act of 1854 called for “popular sovereignty”—that is, the decision about slavery was to be made by the settlers (rather than outsiders). It would be decided by votes—or more exactly which side had more votes counted by officials. At the heart of the conflict was the question of whether Kansas would allow or outlaw slavery, and thus enter the Union as a slave state or a free state. Pro-slavery forces said every settler had the right to bring his own property, including slaves, into the territory. Anti-slavery “free soil” forces said the rich slaveholders would buy up all the good farmland and work it with black slaves, leaving little or no opportunity for non-slaveholders. As such, Bleeding Kansas was a conflict between anti-slavery forces in the North and pro-slavery forces from the South over the issue of slavery in the United States. The term “Bleeding Kansas” was coined by Republican Horace Greeley, editor of the New York Tribune; its violence indicated that compromise was unlikely, and thus it presaged the Civil War.
The point is that a lot of CW arguing ignores the dilemma you describe. Slave-holders saw themselves as abiding by the Constitution (and the Declaration), and Abolitionists, driven by a novel interpretation of Christianity, sought to change the historic status quo.
It was a mess from the start. Had they not assured the Southern states that their economic engine would be protected, the Southern states would not have ratified the Constitution.
But in reassuring the Southern states that slavery would be protected, they left themselves no wiggle room when the culture shifted away from the acceptance of slavery.
My understanding is that things really went sideways when Justice Story ruled in Prigg v Pennsylvania that the states had no obligation to enforce Federal law.
I think this concept is nonsense on the face of it. The idea that a state or a city can nullify federal law through deliberate refusal to enforce it is a very dangerous can of worms to have opened. We are even now seeing the corrosive effects of this doctrine in the guise of states completely flaunting Federal law on Marijuana and "Sanctuaries" for Illegal aliens.
Again, what a mess they created, and of course, Liberal judges just made things worse.
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