The Wilmot Proviso would have kept slavery out of any territory won from Mexico; it passed the House but never became law, yet it drew the sectional battle lines of the next decade. Letting settlers vote on slavery in the West is popular sovereignty, a rival idea. Paying slaveholders to free enslaved people was compensated emancipation, not the proviso. Annexing Cuba as a new slave state was a separate expansionist dream of some Southerners.
Category: Compromise of 1850
Question 2
What was the main goal of the Free-Soil Party, formed in 1848?
Abolishing slavery in every existing state
Keeping slavery out of the western territories
✓
Ending immigration from Catholic countries
Granting free land to formerly enslaved people
Correct Answer
Keeping slavery out of the western territories
Free-Soilers wanted the territories reserved for free white labor and made the Wilmot Proviso their central aim, without demanding an end to slavery where it already existed. Abolishing slavery in every existing state was the abolitionist goal, which most Free-Soilers did not share. Ending immigration from Catholic countries was the cause of nativists such as the Know-Nothings. Granting free land to formerly enslaved people was not part of their program.
Category: Compromise of 1850
Question 3
Lewis Cass and Stephen Douglas promoted which approach to slavery in the western territories?
Banning slavery in every territory by federal law
Extending the 36°30′ line to the Pacific Ocean
Letting each territory's settlers decide by majority vote
✓
Protecting slavery in every territory by federal law
Correct Answer
Letting each territory's settlers decide by majority vote
Popular sovereignty left the slavery question to the voters of each territory, which appealed to politicians who wanted to keep the issue out of Congress. Banning slavery in every territory by federal law was the free-soil position that grew out of the Wilmot Proviso. Extending the 36°30′ line to the Pacific Ocean was a different compromise proposal. Protecting slavery in every territory by federal law was the demand of many Southern Democrats.
Category: Compromise of 1850
Question 4
Which measure in the Compromise of 1850 was the South's chief demand?
Ending the slave trade in Washington, DC
Admitting California to the Union
Settling the boundary of New Mexico
A stronger federal fugitive slave law
✓
Correct Answer
A stronger federal fugitive slave law
Southerners insisted on a tougher law forcing the return of people who had escaped slavery, and the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 gave federal officials new power to do so. Ending the slave trade in Washington, DC was a concession to the North. Admitting California to the Union as a free state also pleased the North. Settling the boundary of New Mexico favored New Mexico over Texas's larger claim.
Category: Fugitive Slave Act
Question 5
Why did many Northerners consider hearings under the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 unfair?
Accused people had no jury and could not testify
✓
Hearings were held only in Southern courts
Accused people had to pay for their own lawyers
State judges could overrule federal commissioners
Correct Answer
Accused people had no jury and could not testify
Federal commissioners decided cases without juries, the accused could not speak in their own defense, and commissioners earned more for sending a person South than for freeing them. Hearings were held only in Southern courts is wrong; commissioners heard cases in the North. Accused people had to pay for their own lawyers was not the central complaint. State judges could overrule federal commissioners is false; the law put the cases in federal hands.
Category: Fugitive Slave Act
Question 6
Why did many abolitionists denounce Daniel Webster after his Seventh of March speech in 1850?
He urged the Southern states to leave the Union
He backed a new fugitive slave law to save the Union
✓
He demanded that Congress pass the Wilmot Proviso
He proposed electing one president for each section
Correct Answer
He backed a new fugitive slave law to save the Union
Webster pleaded for national unity, asked the North to stop pressing the Wilmot Proviso, and supported a stronger fugitive slave law, which antislavery Northerners saw as a betrayal. He urged the Southern states to leave the Union reverses his plea against disunion. He demanded that Congress pass the Wilmot Proviso is the opposite of what he asked. He proposed electing one president for each section was John C. Calhoun's idea.
Category: Fugitive Slave Act
Question 7
What was the political impact of Harriet Beecher Stowe's 1852 novel Uncle Tom's Cabin?
It persuaded Southern states to end slavery
It convinced Congress to repeal the Fugitive Slave Act
It turned many Northern readers against slavery
✓
It persuaded Britain to recognize the Confederacy
Correct Answer
It turned many Northern readers against slavery
The novel portrayed slavery as a sin that tore families apart, became the best-selling novel of the nineteenth century, and hardened antislavery feeling in the North. It persuaded Southern states to end slavery is false; Southerners condemned the book. It convinced Congress to repeal the Fugitive Slave Act did not happen in the 1850s. It persuaded Britain to recognize the Confederacy is false; Britain never recognized it.
Category: Fugitive Slave Act
Question 8
What happened when Boston abolitionists tried to stop Anthony Burns from being returned to slavery in 1854?
A Boston jury declared him legally free
He escaped to Canada with their help
The governor pardoned him under state law
Federal troops marched him to a ship bound for Virginia
✓
Correct Answer
Federal troops marched him to a ship bound for Virginia
Despite mass protests and an attack on the courthouse, President Franklin Pierce sent federal forces, which marched Burns through the streets of Boston to a ship that carried him back to Virginia, a spectacle that deepened Northern anger at the Slave Power; abolitionists later bought his freedom. A Boston jury declared him legally free is wrong because the law allowed no jury. He escaped to Canada with their help did not happen. The governor pardoned him under state law is false; no such pardon applied.
Category: Fugitive Slave Act
Question 9
What did the personal liberty laws passed by several Northern states in the 1850s try to do?
Guarantee jury trials for accused freedom seekers
✓
Allow slaveholders to travel freely with enslaved people
Pay slave catchers for each person they captured
Bar free Black people from settling in the state
Correct Answer
Guarantee jury trials for accused freedom seekers
These state laws gave people accused of escaping slavery legal protections such as jury trials, turning the states' rights argument against federal enforcement. Allow slaveholders to travel freely with enslaved people is the reverse of their purpose. Pay slave catchers for each person they captured describes what slaveholders did, not a state protection. Bar free Black people from settling in the state describes the Black exclusion laws some states passed, a different policy.
Category: Fugitive Slave Act
Question 10
Why did the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854 anger many Northerners?
It admitted Kansas directly as a slave state
It repealed the ban on slavery north of 36°30′
✓
It forced Northern states to pay slave catchers
It gave the Nebraska lands to Mexico
Correct Answer
It repealed the ban on slavery north of 36°30′
By letting settlers decide the slavery question, the act overturned the Missouri Compromise line that had kept slavery out of the northern part of the Louisiana Purchase since 1820. It admitted Kansas directly as a slave state is false; Kansas remained a territory whose settlers would vote. It forced Northern states to pay slave catchers was not part of the act. It gave the Nebraska lands to Mexico is invented.
Category: Kansas-Nebraska Act
Question 11
Which event led directly to the founding of the Republican Party?
The Dred Scott decision
John Brown's raid on Harpers Ferry
Passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act
✓
The election of Abraham Lincoln
Correct Answer
Passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act
Northern Whigs, anti-Nebraska Democrats, Free-Soilers, and abolitionists united in 1854 to oppose the act and stop slavery from spreading into the territories. The Dred Scott decision came in 1857, after the party already existed. John Brown's raid on Harpers Ferry took place in 1859. The election of Abraham Lincoln in 1860 was a Republican victory, not the party's origin.
Category: Party Realignment
Question 12
What drew voters to the American Party, better known as the Know-Nothings, in the 1850s?
Support for immediate abolition of slavery
Demands for cheaper Western land
Opposition to the Mexican-American War
Hostility to immigrants, especially Irish Catholics
✓
Correct Answer
Hostility to immigrants, especially Irish Catholics
The Know-Nothings were nativists who claimed that Catholic immigrants owed their loyalty to the pope, and many members later moved into the Republican Party. Support for immediate abolition of slavery was the position of Garrisonian abolitionists. Demands for cheaper Western land were not the party's core appeal. Opposition to the Mexican-American War had been a Whig and abolitionist cause in the 1840s.
Category: Party Realignment
Question 13
Who were the border ruffians in Kansas Territory?
Proslavery Missourians who crossed over to vote
✓
Antislavery settlers sent from New England
Federal troops guarding the territorial capital
Native warriors defending their lands
Correct Answer
Proslavery Missourians who crossed over to vote
Border ruffians crossed from Missouri to cast fraudulent ballots and helped elect a proslavery territorial legislature, and they fought free-state settlers in the violence called Bleeding Kansas. Antislavery settlers sent from New England were their opponents, aided by the New England Emigrant Aid Society. Federal troops guarding the territorial capital were not called ruffians. Native warriors defending their lands is a different subject entirely.
Category: Kansas-Nebraska Act
Question 14
What did John Brown and his sons do at Pottawatomie Creek in May 1856?
Seized a federal arsenal to arm enslaved people
Killed proslavery settlers in revenge for an attack
✓
Drafted a free-state constitution for Kansas
Defended an antislavery town from a posse
Correct Answer
Killed proslavery settlers in revenge for an attack
Brown, angered that the antislavery town of Lawrence had not resisted a proslavery posse, led a night raid that killed proslavery settlers, none of whom had taken part in that attack. Seized a federal arsenal to arm enslaved people describes his 1859 raid on Harpers Ferry. Drafted a free-state constitution for Kansas was done at Topeka by free-state settlers. Defended an antislavery town from a posse is what Brown thought Lawrence had failed to do.
Category: Kansas-Nebraska Act
Question 15
How did many white Southerners react after Representative Preston Brooks beat Senator Charles Sumner with a cane in 1856?
They demanded that Congress expel Brooks
They called for a national ban on dueling
They praised Brooks and sent him new canes
✓
They urged Brooks to apologize to Massachusetts
Correct Answer
They praised Brooks and sent him new canes
Many Southerners hailed the attack as a defense of honor, and admirers sent Brooks replacement canes, while Northerners saw it as proof of Southern violence. They demanded that Congress expel Brooks reverses the Southern response. They called for a national ban on dueling did not follow the attack. They urged Brooks to apologize to Massachusetts is also contrary to the praise he received.
Category: Kansas-Nebraska Act
Question 16
What did the Supreme Court rule in Dred Scott v. Sandford in 1857?
Living in free territory made an enslaved person free
Each state had to free enslaved people who entered it
Every territory had to decide slavery by popular vote
Congress could not bar slavery from the territories
✓
Correct Answer
Congress could not bar slavery from the territories
The Court held that Black people could not be citizens, that Congress had no power to limit slavery in the territories, and that the Missouri Compromise was therefore unconstitutional. Living in free territory made an enslaved person free was Scott's argument, which the Court rejected. Each state had to free enslaved people who entered it was not ruled. Every territory had to decide slavery by popular vote is the reverse; the ruling undercut popular sovereignty.
Category: Dred Scott and Debates
Question 17
Why did Stephen Douglas's Freeport Doctrine, stated during the 1858 debates, hurt him nationally?
It angered proslavery Southern Democrats
✓
It angered antislavery Illinois voters
It cost him the 1858 Senate seat
It led the Whigs to nominate him
Correct Answer
It angered proslavery Southern Democrats
Douglas said settlers could still keep slavery out of a territory by refusing to protect it, whatever the Supreme Court ruled, which helped him in Illinois but cost him Southern support in the 1860 race. It angered antislavery Illinois voters is the opposite; the position helped him at home. It cost him the 1858 Senate seat is false, because Douglas kept the seat. It led the Whigs to nominate him is wrong; Douglas was a Democrat and the Whigs had collapsed.
Category: Dred Scott and Debates
Question 18
Which candidate represented the Southern Democrats in the 1860 presidential election?
John Bell
John C. Breckinridge
✓
Stephen Douglas
Abraham Lincoln
Correct Answer
John C. Breckinridge
After the Democrats split, Southern delegates nominated Vice President John C. Breckinridge of Kentucky on a platform protecting slavery in the territories. John Bell ran for the Constitutional Union Party. Stephen Douglas was the Northern Democratic nominee. Abraham Lincoln was the Republican candidate.
Category: Election of 1860
Question 19
What was the goal of John Brown's 1859 raid on the federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry?
To steal funds for the Republican campaign
To free John Brown's sons from a Virginia jail
To arm enslaved people for a mass uprising
✓
To force Congress to admit Kansas as a free state
Correct Answer
To arm enslaved people for a mass uprising
Brown and his small band of Black and white followers seized the arsenal hoping to give weapons to enslaved people and start a revolt, but no uprising came, and US Marines stormed the engine house where the raiders were trapped, killing several and capturing Brown. To steal funds for the Republican campaign is invented. To free John Brown's sons from a Virginia jail did not happen. To force Congress to admit Kansas as a free state was not the purpose of the raid.
Category: Election of 1860
Question 20
How did Abraham Lincoln win the presidency in 1860?
He won a majority of the national popular vote
He swept the slave states after Douglas withdrew
He won after the House of Representatives chose him
He carried nearly all the free states for an electoral majority
✓
Correct Answer
He carried nearly all the free states for an electoral majority
Lincoln won only about 40 percent of the popular vote, and his name was missing from many Southern ballots, but his strength in the populous free states gave him a clear Electoral College majority. He won a majority of the national popular vote is false. He swept the slave states after Douglas withdrew is false; Breckinridge and Bell carried the South. He won after the House of Representatives chose him did not happen because he had an electoral majority.
Category: Election of 1860