The Lecompton Constitution

The Dred Scott Decision intensified the slavery controversy

1857- the pro-slavery legislature called for a constitutional convention at Lecompton

The convention wrote a constitution making Kansas a slave state

1. President Buchanon had promised a fair referendum on the constitution
2. To ensure a pro-slavery outcome, voters were given a choice between constitution with slavery or without slavery

• trick was that the constitution without slavery still allowed active slaveowners to keep their slaves and the the children of those slaves

Free voters boycotted the vote on the constitution

• 1/4 of the population approved the constitution with slavery

Meanwhile in a Fair election policed by federal troops, the anti-slavery party won control of the territorial legislature and promptly submitted both constitutions to a referendum that was boycotted by pro-slavery voters

• 70% of voters voted and rejected both constitutions

When Southerners threatened secession if Kansas was admitted as a free state, Buchanon caved in and recommended that congress admit Lecompton

Stephen Douglas was in a bind

• if he voted for Lecompton, Illinois would very likely not re-elect him and it was against his belief in popular soveirgnty

Douglas did break with the democratic President Buchanon

• when the dust settled in the senate, lecompton was defeated
• sent back to Kansas voters
• Kansas voters voted on it and rejected it
• Kansas was not admitted at all until 1861

Lecompton debate split the democratic party into the Northern Democrats and Southern Democrats. this all but ensured the election of 1960 to be won by a Republican.

THE ECONOMY

From the mid-1840's to the late 1850's economy grew on rails

• most of the new track was laid in the old Northwest and strenghtened the East-West links across the North
• transportation was changing from dependance on river travel (North-South) to an East-West canal and rail travel
• provided jobs in construction for the immigrants

During the 1850's industrial output in the free states west of Pennsylvania grew three times the pace of NorthEast and four times that of the South

• Chicago was the hub for 15 railroads
• Illinois became the home to the McCormick Reaper factory in Chicago and the John Deere plow factory in Moline

During this time the US became the 2nd leading industrial producer in the world

Eli Whitney development of mass production (started with rifles)was a major stimulus to industrial growth

Southern Views Of Slavery

Public Education had not caught on in the South but the Southern economy did well after 1845

• the price of slaves doubled between 1845 and 1855

A growing number of Southerners were aware that their economy was dependant on the export of agricultural products and the import of manufactured goods

Ships that carried cotton, warehouses, insurance companies were all owned by Northerners

These Southerners began to worry about gaining economic independance from the North but all they could do was worry because the North was growing faster than they could keep up

King Cotton asserted itself as cotton output and prices rose

• kept demand for slaves high
• Southerners argued that their slaves were better off than than the immigrant factory workers in the North
• certainly working conditions in the Northern factories were grim: long hours, low pay, unsafe factories, slum housing, overcrowding, disease, poverty, and desperate prostitution
• but they werent slaves and there was more opportunity for improvement up North

Sectional tension

The Panic of 1857 hit in the fall

• grain sales, to Europe, slumped
• high interest rates spread from Europe to US and dried up credit
• because times had been good

To be Continued when Mr Gottshalk's voice recovers...