Thomas Kilbride

12/18/08

Period-2

AP US History

The United States’ struggle for compromise during the 19th century

During the early 19th century America was able to solve most of its political disputes via

means of compromise; however by the year 1860 this was no longer possible. During this time

span there were many issues which divided the North and South, these disagreements lead to

violent outbreaks, petitions, and rebellions which eventually lead to the American Civil War. It is

said that Americans were no longer able to reside their political disputes with compromise

because of Sectionalism, Westward Expansion, the Peculiar Institutions, and the Secession of the

southern colonies. These events were dividing the colonies in the years predating 1860, making

it harder for Americans to make decisions that could satisfy everyone and with the addition of

Sectionalism the colonies were ready to separate by 1860. One can justify this by analyzing key

events during this time period, looking for examples of the division which disabled America’s

previous ability to solve its problems via compromise.

One of the key events in this time period which was a major contributor of America’s

inability to compromise was Sectionalism. Sectionalism caused the Northern colonies to divide

from the south because of their political disagreements. This also caused the American people to

become more loyal to their own region’s interests rather than the nations interests as a whole

[Doc A and Doc D]. Therefore Sectionalism made the compromise of political issues leading to

1860 very difficult for America because it caused a large portion of the United States to disagree

completely with the other. One example can be seen when American Politician’s were trying to

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decide which of the new western states would be free, or slave states. Even though this was near

impossible to compromise; American politicians managed to satisfy both parties with the

Missouri Compromise of 1820. However, American politician’s behavior towards during this

time was characterized as being distracted from the bigger picture, solutions were only

temporary. This would be addressed later by Abraham Lincoln in during his speech in Illinois

during 1858, where he calls the other Politian’s cowards [Doc G].

Another one key event during this time span which can be used to show the decline of

America’s ability to compromise was Westward Expansion. Westward Expansion encouraged

many people to move west which opened new land and opportunities. As these opportunities

became available to the American people, the demand for slaves to harvest the new land also

grew. With the addition of the North questioning the humanity of slavery, the issue of expanding

slavery into the new land grew [Doc B]. This declined America’s ability to compromise because

it created many issues surrounding wither the new states should be free or slave states. A good

example of this is the Missouri Compromise where the North did not want slavery to expand into

Missouri or Maine, while the South wanted the opposite. The North decided to compromise by

admitting Missouri as a slave state and admitting Maine into the Union as a free state, it also

abolished slavery in states north of the 36°30' parallel. Other compromises in the future got even

more heated, such as the Compromise of 1850 and the Kansas-Nebraska act, where people in

Kansas got so agitated with the Kansas-Nebraska act laws that an event called “Bleeding

Kansas” caused a mass eruption of violence to occur. This violence showed division and the

willingness of the South to fight for their rights against the North, who wanted compromise [Doc

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E]. Events like that which did not favor slavery were grouped among other laws and acts; this

group was called the Peculiar Institution.

The peculiar institution was what pro-slavery people referred to a group of that they

thought were unfair towards them. They felt as if their word was not getting out, and they were

being suppressed. This can be seen with the Gag rule [Doc C], where congress tabled, and

ignored every petition regarding slavery sent to them. This enraged the south because they felt

that everyone was picking on them, and were not being treated fairly by the north.

The final reason which shows America’s declining ability to compromise was

successionism. With election of 1860, Abraham Lincoln won the election with 39% of the

popular vote [Doc H], this enraged the south and was the straw that broke the camel’s back.

Abraham wanted to preserve the union via means of compromise; however the South wanted to

keep their way by whatever means possible [Doc E]. This showed that the Electoral College

overruled the popular vote, which caused the South to start to form militias and eventually

succeed from the Union. This literally divided the Union, which was shortly followed by the

American Civil war.

The events line up to show a trend that America wasn’t able to compromise because they

were too divided. Being divided on so many issues causes the American government system to

fail; this is because the system is designed upon the concept of compromise. One can say that

this isn’t true because the Northern states could have let the Southern states keep slavery below

the Parallel 36°30', however this would not have worked because slavery would have spread to

the tip of South America. This shows that if the government cannot agree on anything then it will

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be impossible to create a compromise, which was the problem that the government was facing

during this time period.