The Constitution, proposed by James Madison at the convention in Philadelphia in 1787 sought to establish a better set of governing principles for the United States. Though the Constitution maintained the stronghold grip on suppressing the rights of African slaves, it provided a radical change form state sovereignty to federalism while respecting the rights of states. ... This can be shown through the fugitive slave clause, which states that escaped slaves were not free once crossing into other states and had to be returned to the owner. ... Because larger states argued that their population w...

• Word Count: 597
• Approx Pages: 2
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

When the 55 delegates of the Confederation came together in 1787 to record their ideas in the United States Constitution via consensus, the subject touching upon slavery in the States turned out to be the most debated point. ... With the intention to secure participation of all 13 States in the Union, the framers of the Constitution allowed slavery to be continued in the nation where "all men are created equal". ... However, they agreed to the compromise stated in the final version of the Article yet again to assure the participation of all the states in completing the Constitution. ... It st...

• Word Count: 858
• Approx Pages: 3
• Has Bibliography
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

The hole that the Constitution left for states rights and the nature of the Union became a deep gash and eventually a dividing line for the United States. ... For nearly 75 years the United States of America was a nation that prided itself in its ability to compromise. ... The Constitution was no longer an agreement between all States, it had now become a central power set up above and over the States. ... Were the states a permanent member, or a voluntary independent? In the South, the Constitution was viewed as an agreement between several states, and that they could lawfully and peaceful...

• Word Count: 485
• Approx Pages: 2
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

Failure to live by the statement, "All men are created equal," and honor the inalienable rights of people following the American Revolution, is not the main precursor that doomed the United States to a Civil War. ... However, the political differences between the North and the South, is what drew the line between the two regions, and sent the United States into a Civil War that would threaten the stability, and peace of the nation. ... The Federalists in the North, wanted a strong central government and chose to take a loose interpretation of the Constitution. The opposing political ...

• Word Count: 693
• Approx Pages: 3
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

Following the 1819 crisis over statehood for Missouri, a national two-party system developed, and both parties worked to prevent sectional differences from becoming the focus of politics, this failed when the Mexican War gave the United States new territories. ... Southern states, including the 11 states that formed the Confederacy, depended on slavery to support their economy. ... This theory held that the Constitution had created not a perpetual union but a compact between independent states that retained their sovereignty. ... The Constitution had stated that "the union shall be perpetual."...

• Word Count: 748
• Approx Pages: 3
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

Although it wasn't until the 1860's that national unity had been split between North and South, national unity started to fade as the United States was expanding in the early 1800's. ... The Southern states felt that they had a lack of representation and power in the government as more states where declared free. Therefore the expansion played a great part in the thinning of the unity of the United States. In Document B, the separation starts as lines are drawn in the Louisiana Purchase as to where states can be free or slave states. ... They believed that slaves were property...

• Word Count: 505
• Approx Pages: 2
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

Bill of Rights - the first ten amendments to the u.s. constitution, which protect the rights of individuals from the powers of the government. ... Second Great Awakening - a wave of religious fervor and revivalism that swept the United States from the early nineteenth century through the Civil War. ... Treaty of Guadelupe Hidalgo - the peace treaty ending the Mexican War gave the United States California, Nevada, New Mexico, Utah, and parts of Arizona, Colorado, Kansas, and Wyoming in exchange for $15 million and assumption of $3.25 million in debts owed to Americans by Mexico. The treaty also...

• Word Count: 646
• Approx Pages: 3
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

Native Americans, many of whom sided with the British in hopes of stopping colonial expansion onto native land, had large tribal territories relinquished to the newly formed United States after the war. ... Without question, the wealth of Southern plantations, and the Northern states, were directly associated with the exploitation of African slave labor. ... Constitution itself did not outright endorse slavery in America moving forward, there were numerous clauses that ensured the black population would be kept in check. The Constitution enforced the return of fleeing slaves to their masters, ...

• Word Count: 572
• Approx Pages: 2
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

Freedom I feel that January 1st is the day of the year that is most suitable as a day of honor and celebration for the United States of America. ... That goals of abolishing slavery in all parts of the United States became reality with the Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution. ... The Constitution of the United States recognized the legality of slavery, the ultimate form of discrimination. ... In December of 1865, just months after the close the American Civil War, the Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution was passed and forbid the owning of slaves in all parts of the United States, fu...

• Word Count: 622
• Approx Pages: 2
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

Early in the year 1787, the framers of the constitution convened in Philadelphia to discuss the problems of governing the new nation. Among the problems debated that existed with the states was the incorporation of western territories and whether they would be slave states or "free states." ... During the year of 1819, the nation was comprised of 22 states, and of them, 11 were "free states" and 11 were considered "slave states." It is clear what the impact of adding another state would do to the even sided nation; by adding a new state the union essentially knocks off the comfortable balance ...

• Word Count: 855
• Approx Pages: 3
• Has Bibliography
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

In 1860, Lincoln Abraham was elected as president of the United States of America. The election prompted several southern slave states to secede and later a four-year long civil war between the North and the South was triggered. ... It was understandable because Lincoln was the president of the United States and preserving the Union was part of his responsibility. ... He had to protect the perpetuity of the Constitution, because based on which he established the illegitimacy of secession. ... He was further limited by the Constitution whose legitimacy and perpetuity he tried to preserve during...

• Word Count: 1248
• Approx Pages: 5
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

Slavery was sheltered by the Constitution, which prevented him from making hasty actions in regarding to slavery. ... Lincoln acknowledged that "neither Congress nor a Territorial legislature can exclude slavery from any United States Territory,"" but he was a strong believer in limiting the spread of slavery. ... He began to think "of the United States as a biracial society" which would make whites living with blacks tough. ... With the question of egalitarianism, it brought up the question of colonization of African Americans out of the United States. ... Lincoln was pro colonization, th...

• Word Count: 1671
• Approx Pages: 7
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

According to historian, Gene Dattel, Slave-produced cotton brought commercial ascendancy to New York City, cotton was the driving force for territorial expansion in the South and fostered trade between Europe and the United States. ... Serious tensions between the free and salve states evolved from different developing economic systems in The United States. ... Jefferson considered the 10th amendment to be "the foundation of the Constitution." 5 It reads: "All powers not delegated to the U.S. by the Constitution, not prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states or to...

• Word Count: 3046
• Approx Pages: 12
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

Abraham Lincoln, sixteenth president of the United States, was elected to office while America was approaching one of the most momentous periods in its history. ... It was because of Lincoln's views against slavery that caused "seven states to secede from the Union" in February 1861 (Roark 383). ... He never promised that he was going to end slavery altogether because he respected the fact that the "Constitution permitted slavery where it existed", simply because he knew it was a big part of the southern economy (Roark 383). ... Of course, Lincoln ended up winning all ...

• Word Count: 600
• Approx Pages: 2
• Has Bibliography
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

The Southerners began to defend their belief through the Constitution itself. They had taken the constitution and found ways to manipulate it to defend Slavery. ... They would point out that there was no actual amendment made to the constitution discussing slavery and most of all no amendment made towards the government even frowning upon slavery. ... This was a tradition of the United States and anyone trying to break that traditionalism would them themselves be contributing the secession of the Union. ... However, no matter the number of justifications, the South had their definition ...

• Word Count: 708
• Approx Pages: 3
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

The Missouri discussions held 1819-1821 functioned as an important turn in the United States' major disagreement over slavery. ... The planned admittance of Missouri to the Union sanctioned its populations to draft a state constitution and Missourians began the second act of the problematic situation with a draft constitution ensuring slavery and excluding free people of color from coming into their state. In 1820 to 1821, the nation and Congress disputed the suitability of the Missouri state constitution. ... In retort this stretched vocal treatment of the problem of slavery in the Unite...

• Word Count: 2503
• Approx Pages: 10
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

"Without Lincoln's election in 1860, the Southern states would not have seceded in 1861, the war would not have come when and as it did, the door of emancipation would not have been open as it was." ... was the most persuasive and the more rational explanation for his conclusions that it was the driving force of Abraham Lincoln himself that eventually brought an end not only to slavery in the South but to the end of Slavery as an institution in the United States. ... Fields, he answers each point in their argument with I think some overwhelming rebuttals to their arguments that Lincoln...

• Word Count: 850
• Approx Pages: 3
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

It played an important role in the anti-slavery movement from the smallest towns of the United States all the way to the shores of Europe. ... Lincoln declared the work as "a necessary measure of war- and used his power as "Commander-in-Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States- (Emancipation Proclamation). ... First of all, it only applied to states that had seceded from the Union, not to the border states. ... Many states, including Maryland, Tennessee, and Louisiana, amended their state constitutions to abolish slavery. ... But I understand that Lincoln had to convey it as a war...

• Word Count: 1677
• Approx Pages: 7
• Has Bibliography
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

He used his role as president to uphold the Constitution, but also to preserve, protect, and defend it during a war which, he in essence started. ... Southern agriculturist states saw themselves as being controlled and used by the Northern industrialist states. ... However it took a bloody civil war that engulfed the nation as Lincoln vowed to preserve the Union, enforce the laws of the United States, and end the secession. ... He eventually raised an army and navy of nearly 3 million Northern men to face a Southern army of over 2 million soldiers and in battles fought from Virginia to Califor...

• Word Count: 1215
• Approx Pages: 5
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

The individual states have often tried to prevent a strong central government; even before our forefathers could build the framework of our constitution. As evidenced by the civil war, the states failed in their attempts to hold political dominance and the federal government prevailed. ... The amendment's most important provision, was to defined an American citizen as anyone born in the United States or naturalized, thereby automatically making African Americans citizens. ... Resulting in, the final amendment left loopholes that eventually allowed southern states to disfranchise African...

• Word Count: 695
• Approx Pages: 3
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

In Eric Foner's "A Short History of Reconstruction" he offers the readers an in depth analysis and commentary on this deeply historical period in the United States. ... During the election of 1860 the United States spanned the entire continent. ... Bleeding Kansas was the treatment of runaway slaves and several other issues involving slavery that stressed and eventually crushed the United States two party system that was in place for a generation to mold sections and ideals into two dominant national institutions. ... Republicans did not associate with the abolitionist because...

• Word Count: 1202
• Approx Pages: 5
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

There was some fear that, in the event of strong antislavery legislation, the Southern states might withdraw from the Union altogether. ... The Compromise of 1850 accomplished what it set out to do: it kept the nation united, but the solution was only temporary. ... Through a Southern rigging of the ballot, a state constitution passed permitting slavery, despite free-soilers outnumbering proslavery citizens by three to one. ...

• Word Count: 536
• Approx Pages: 2
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

Abraham Lincoln is a perfect example of leadership and legacy with his greatly successful job of ruling the United States of America and without him slavery may still be around today in some parts of the United States and the Confederacy likely a separate country, broken away from the US. ... Shortly after his term in the US House of Representatives he proposed an amendment to the constitution to abolish slavery which did not get passed but showed how much Abraham was against slavery. ... In 1860, Abraham Lincoln won in the race for President against three Decorative representatives and becam...

• Word Count: 2022
• Approx Pages: 8
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

The thesis statement is that Lincoln sought to preserve the American union and its system of self-government by reclaiming the ideals of the Declaration of Independence and to recover the Spirit of '76 to the American mind which states that "all men are created equal". ... He believed that federal constitution was being reinterpreted to establish a race-based, not a natural-rights-based, system of government that would extend slavery into every territory and state of the American union. In addition, the Founders planned to cut off its supply and restrict its expansion, which in ...

• Word Count: 2032
• Approx Pages: 8
• Has Bibliography
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

In the northern states a small but very articulate group of abolitionists formed to speak out against the abomination of slavery. ... " He quickly proved that every slave was a man and deserved to be counted equally, regardless of color, but on the grounds of being born in the United States of America and being engaged in all enterprises that were common to other men. ... In his cleverly crafted speech Douglass used logos, an appeal based on logic and reasoning, to demonstrate to his audience the severe double standard that existed in the United States. Prior to giving this speech Douglas...

• Word Count: 1369
• Approx Pages: 5
• Grade Level: Undergraduate