Download or read book Bleeding Kansas written by Nicole Etcheson and published by University Press of Kansas. This book was released on 2004-01-29 with total page 384 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Few people would have expected bloodshed in Kansas Territory. After all, it had few slaves and showed few signs that slavery would even flourish. But civil war tore this territory apart in the 1850s and 60s, and "Bleeding Kansas" became a forbidding symbol for the nationwide clash over slavery that followed. Many free-state Kansans seemed to care little about slaves, and many proslavery Kansans owned not a single slave. But the failed promise of the Kansas-Nebraska Act-when fraud in local elections subverted the settlers' right to choose whether Kansas would be a slave or free state-fanned the flames of war. While other writers have cited slavery or economics as the cause of unrest, Nicole Etcheson seeks to revise our understanding of this era by focusing on whites' concerns over their political liberties. The first comprehensive account of "Bleeding Kansas" in more than thirty years, her study re-examines the debate over slavery expansion to emphasize issues of popular sovereignty rather than slavery's moral or economic dimensions. The free-state movement was a coalition of settlers who favored black rights and others who wanted the territory only for whites, but all were united by the conviction that their political rights were violated by nonresident voting and by Democratic presidents' heavy-handed administration of the territories. Etcheson argues that participants on both sides of the Kansas conflict believed they fought to preserve the liberties secured by the American Revolution and that violence erupted because each side feared the loss of meaningful self-governance. Bleeding Kansas is a gripping account of events and people-rabble-rousing Jim Lane, zealot John Brown, Sheriff Sam Jones, and others-that examines the social milieu of the settlers along with the political ideas they developed. Covering the period from the 1854 Kansas-Nebraska Act to the 1879 Exoduster Migration, it traces the complex interactions among groups inside and outside the territory, creating a comprehensive political, social, and intellectual history of this tumultuous period in the state's history. As Etcheson demonstrates, the struggle over the political liberties of whites may have heightened the turmoil but led eventually to a broadening of the definition of freedom to include blacks. Her insightful re-examination sheds new light on this era and is essential reading for anyone interested in the ideological origins of the Civil War.

Download or read book Political Debates Between Abraham Lincoln and Stephen A Douglas in the Celebrated Campaign of 1858 in Illinois written by Abraham Lincoln and published by . This book was released on 1895 with total page 582 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book The Impending Crisis of the South written by Hinton Rowan Helper and published by BoD – Books on Demand. This book was released on 2023-04-29 with total page 425 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Reprint of the original, first published in 1859. The publishing house Anatiposi publishes historical books as reprints. Due to their age, these books may have missing pages or inferior quality. Our aim is to preserve these books and make them available to the public so that they do not get lost.

Download or read book The Stormy Present written by Adam I. P. Smith and published by UNC Press Books. This book was released on 2017-10-06 with total page 345 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this engaging and nuanced political history of Northern communities in the Civil War era, Adam I. P. Smith offers a new interpretation of the familiar story of the path to war and ultimate victory. Smith looks beyond the political divisions between abolitionist Republicans and Copperhead Democrats to consider the everyday conservatism that characterized the majority of Northern voters. A sense of ongoing crisis in these Northern states created anxiety and instability, which manifested in a range of social and political tensions in individual communities. In the face of such realities, Smith argues that a conservative impulse was more than just a historical or nostalgic tendency; it was fundamental to charting a path to the future. At stake for Northerners was their conception of the Union as the vanguard in a global struggle between democracy and despotism, and their ability to navigate their freedoms through the stormy waters of modernity. As a result, the language of conservatism was peculiarly, and revealingly, prominent in Northern politics during these years. The story this book tells is of conservative people coming, in the end, to accept radical change.

Download or read book The Kansas State Constitution written by Professor Francis H. Heller and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2011-04-18 with total page 178 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Formally, Kansas still operates under a constitution dating from 1959. However, its present day basic law differs importantly from the original text. In The Kansas State Constitution, Francis H. Heller offers an unprecedented explanation of Kansas's experience with "incremental revision." In The Kansas State Constitution, Francis H. Heller carefully traces the history and development of the Kansas state constitution. Heller includes the constitutional text in its entirety and offers accompanying descriptions of specific constitutional provisions. These descriptions provide readers with important information about the origins each provision, as well as ways in which the courts and other governmental bodies have interpreted them. A bibliographical essay describing the most important sources of the constitutional history and constitutional law of Kansas, making this an indispensable for students, scholars, and practitioners of Kansas's constitution. Previously published by Greenwood, this title has been brought back in to circulation by Oxford University Press with new verve. Re-printed with standardization of content organization in order to facilitate research across the series, this title, as with all titles in the series, is set to join the dynamic revision cycle of The Oxford Commentaries on the State Constitutions of the United States. The Oxford Commentaries on the State Constitutions of the United States is an important series that reflects a renewed international interest in constitutional history and provides expert insight into each of the 50 state constitutions. Each volume in this innovative series contains a historical overview of the state's constitutional development, a section-by-section analysis of its current constitution, and a comprehensive guide to further research. Under the expert editorship of Professor G. Alan Tarr, Director of the Center on State Constitutional Studies at Rutgers University, this series provides essential reference tools for understanding state constitutional law. Books in the series can be purchased individually or as part of a complete set, giving readers unmatched access to these important political documents.

Download or read book Seeding Civil War written by H. Craig Miner and published by . This book was released on 2008 with total page 364 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Following the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act, Kansas Territory was a national issue that dominated America's press, not to mention three sessions of Congress." "Craig Miner now offers the first in-depth study of national media coverage devoted to the beleaguered territory, unearthing new examples of what Americans were saying about Kansas and showing how those words affected the course of national events." "Miner draws on dozens of newspapers and magazines from all parts of the country and of all political persuasions: a trove of rich quotations and unvarnished epithets, nearly all of them published here for the first time. He reveals how the heated, polarizing rhetoric widened the sectional rift, weakened chances of accommodation, and contributed more to the onset of civil war than has been previously recognized."--BOOK JACKET.

Download or read book Compendium of the Impending Crisis of the South written by Hinton Rowan Helper and published by Gale Cengage Learning. This book was released on 1860 with total page 224 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book condemns slavery, by appealed to whites' rational self-interest, rather than any altruism towards blacks. Helper claimed that slavery hurt the Southern economy by preventing economic development and industrialization, and that it was the main reason why the South had progressed so much less than the North since the late 18th century.

Download or read book The Fiery Trial Abraham Lincoln and American Slavery written by Eric Foner and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 2011-09-26 with total page 464 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “A masterwork [by] the preeminent historian of the Civil War era.”—Boston Globe Selected as a Notable Book of the Year by the New York Times Book Review, this landmark work gives us a definitive account of Lincoln's lifelong engagement with the nation's critical issue: American slavery. A master historian, Eric Foner draws Lincoln and the broader history of the period into perfect balance. We see Lincoln, a pragmatic politician grounded in principle, deftly navigating the dynamic politics of antislavery, secession, and civil war. Lincoln's greatness emerges from his capacity for moral and political growth.

Download or read book Beyond the Mississippi written by Albert Deane Richardson and published by . This book was released on 1869 with total page 664 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Northern Men with Southern Loyalties written by Michael Todd Landis and published by Cornell University Press. This book was released on 2014-11-20 with total page 345 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the decade before the Civil War, Northern Democrats, although they ostensibly represented antislavery and free-state constituencies, made possible the passage of such proslavery legislation as the Compromise of 1850 and Fugitive Slave Law of the same year, the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854, and the Lecompton Constitution of 1858. In Northern Men with Southern Loyalties, Michael Todd Landis forcefully contends that a full understanding of the Civil War and its causes is impossible without a careful examination of Northern Democrats and their proslavery sentiments and activities. He focuses on a variety of key Democratic politicians, such as Stephen Douglas, William Marcy, and Jesse Bright, to unravel the puzzle of Northern Democratic political allegiance to the South. As congressmen, state party bosses, convention wire-pullers, cabinet officials, and presidents, these men produced the legislation and policies that led to the fragmentation of the party and catastrophic disunion.Through a careful examination of correspondence, speeches, public and private utterances, memoirs, and personal anecdotes, Landis lays bare the desires and designs of Northern Democrats. He ventures into the complex realm of state politics and party mechanics, drawing connections between national events and district and state activity as well as between partisan dynamics and national policy. Northern Democrats had to walk a perilously thin line between loyalty to the Southern party leaders and answering to their free-state constituents. If Northern Democrats sought high office, they would have to cater to the "Slave Power." Yet, if they hoped for election at home, they had to convince voters that they were not mere lackeys of the Southern grandees.

Download or read book The Constitutional Origins of the American Civil War written by Michael F. Conlin and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2019-07-18 with total page 351 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Demonstrates the crucial role that the Constitution played in the coming of the Civil War.

Download or read book James Buchanan written by Jean H. Baker and published by Macmillan. This book was released on 2004 with total page 198 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 1. Buchanan, James, 1791-1868 2. Presidents United States Biography 3. United States - Politics and Government - 1857-1861.

Download or read book Lincoln and Douglas written by Allen C. Guelzo and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2010-05-11 with total page 595 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the two-time winner of the prestigious Lincoln Prize, a stirring and surprising account of the debates that made Lincoln a national figure and defined the slavery issue that would bring the country to war. In 1858, Abraham Lincoln was known as a successful Illinois lawyer who had achieved some prominence in state politics as a leader in the new Republican Party. Two years later, he was elected president and was on his way to becoming the greatest chief executive in American history. What carried this one-term congressman from obscurity to fame was the campaign he mounted for the United States Senate against the country’s most formidable politician, Stephen A. Douglas, in the summer and fall of 1858. As this brilliant narrative by the prize-winning Lincoln scholar Allen Guelzo dramatizes, Lincoln would emerge a predominant national figure, the leader of his party, the man who would bear the burden of the national confrontation. Lincoln lost that Senate race to Douglas, though he came close to toppling the “Little Giant,” whom almost everyone thought was unbeatable. Guelzo’s Lincoln and Douglas brings alive their debates and this whole year of campaigns and underscores their centrality in the greatest conflict in American history. The encounters between Lincoln and Douglas engage a key question in American political life: What is democracy's purpose? Is it to satisfy the desires of the majority? Or is it to achieve a just and moral public order? These were the real questions in 1858 that led to the Civil War. They remain questions for Americans today.

Download or read book An Act to Organize the Territories of Nebraska and Kansas written by United States and published by . This book was released on 1854 with total page 24 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Report of the Special Committee written by United States. Congress. House. Committee to Investigate the Troubles in Kansas and published by . This book was released on 1856 with total page 1362 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book The F Street Mess written by Alice Elizabeth Malavasic and published by UNC Press Books. This book was released on 2017-09-26 with total page 281 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Pushing back against the idea that the Slave Power conspiracy was merely an ideological construction, Alice Elizabeth Malavasic argues that some southern politicians in the 1850s did indeed hold an inordinate amount of power in the antebellum Congress and used it to foster the interests of slavery. Malavasic focuses her argument on Senators David Rice Atchison of Missouri, Andrew Pickens Butler of South Carolina, and Robert M. T. Hunter and James Murray Mason of Virginia, known by their contemporaries as the "F Street Mess" for the location of the house they shared. Unlike the earlier and better-known triumvirate of John C. Calhoun, Henry Clay, and Daniel Webster, the F Street Mess was a functioning oligarchy within the U.S. Senate whose power was based on shared ideology, institutional seniority, and personal friendship. By centering on their most significant achievement--forcing a rewrite of the Nebraska bill that repealed the restriction against slavery above the 36 degrees 30′ parallel--Malavasic demonstrates how the F Street Mess's mastery of the legislative process led to one of the most destructive pieces of legislation in United States history and helped pave the way to secession.

Download or read book Disunion written by Elizabeth R. Varon and published by Univ of North Carolina Press. This book was released on 2008-11-15 with total page 470 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the decades of the early republic, Americans debating the fate of slavery often invoked the specter of disunion to frighten their opponents. As Elizabeth Varon shows, "disunion" connoted the dissolution of the republic--the failure of the founders' effort to establish a stable and lasting representative government. For many Americans in both the North and the South, disunion was a nightmare, a cataclysm that would plunge the nation into the kind of fear and misery that seemed to pervade the rest of the world. For many others, however, disunion was seen as the main instrument by which they could achieve their partisan and sectional goals. Varon blends political history with intellectual, cultural, and gender history to examine the ongoing debates over disunion that long preceded the secession crisis of 1860-61.