Civil War Dbq

Tensions in the Northern and Southern territories were high. All signs pointed to a civil war, and the anger between both sides rose as they reached a breaking point. In 1860 when Republican President Abraham Lincoln was elected, the republic was headed directly towards a civil war, as he was clearly against the expansion of slavery, which upset many Southern citizens. The Union, which was made up of the Northern Abolitionists, descended deeper into conflict with the Confederacy, which was pro-slavery Southerners. John Brown, Stephen Douglas, and of course Abraham Lincoln all contributed to these arguments that rapidly brought the Civil War upon the nation. The first figure in the coming of the Civil War is the great John Brown. "Old Brown"

Douglas was in many ways the opposite of Lincoln, who he was up against for a seat on the Senate. Lincoln was tall, lanky, and slow of speech while Douglas was short, well groomed, and filled with energy. The two engaged in a series of debates that greatly impacted the beginnings of the Civil War, the most important being the debate at Freeport, Illinois. Lincoln presented Douglas with a dilemma. He wondered what would happen if the people of a territory should vote slavery down. The Supreme Court in the Dred Scott decision said they could not, so who would win: the Court or the people? Douglas met this issue head on, with the Freeport Doctrine, saying no matter how the Supreme Court ruled, slavery would stay down if the people voted it down. This shows the "Little Giant's" loyalty to popular sovereignty, which won him the senate seat. But because he won, he hurt his chances of becoming president because the southern Democrats did not support him because of the Lecompton Constitution, and were determined not to accept him in his party. So, his longtime opponent, Abraham Lincoln, becomes one of the most important figures in our history as president, while Douglas did not impact the start of the Civil War until he began to debate with his "enemy" (Kennedy and Cohen

Lincoln, raised in rural poverty and self taught, began his political career at age 25, when he was elected to the Illinois state legislature as a Whig. By 1836 he was practicing law in Springfield; he soon gained a reputation for integrity and directness which earned him the title “Honest Abe.” Lincoln’s political career began with his opposition to the Kansas-Nebraska Act and its implicit support for the expansion of slavery promoted by Douglas (Anderson). The most important part of his career was the time of his presidency. As he was running for president, Lincoln was constantly being called a "baboon" and an "abolitionist" rail-splitter, while he was not even an outright abolitionist, by the southern secessionists. He was not even allowed to be in any voting ballots in the south. But, Lincoln was elected president after a close race with Douglas. This was not as great a win as it seems, because the South still had a majority in the Supreme Court, and the Republicans did not control the Senate or the House of Representatives. The federal government could not touch slavery in states where it already existed, unless there was a constitutional amendment, which required 1/4 of the states votes to be defeated. And at this point, the 15 slave states were half of the total. Anger was brewing in all of the states, and South Carolina made a rash decision four days after the election of