Dred Scott Case

Dred Scott, a slave who had lived in the free state of Illinois and the free territory of Wisconsin before moving back to the slave state of Missouri, had sued in hopes of obtaining his freedom.  Even though he lost the case, it got the attention of many people, and started many conflicts.

image: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/97/DredScott.jpg

Gettysburg

The battle of Gettysburg was often described as the turning point of the war due to heavy casualities.  Both sides of the battle suffered a massive 23,00 casualities, which is 46,00 total casualities.  Although both lost the same amount of soldiers, it was a victory for the North, because they had more soldiers to spare, and it stopped general Lee's invasion of the North.

Image: http://www.prx.org/pieces/98152-gettysburg

Nullification

Many felt that the new constitution ignored the rights of states to continue to act independently. They felt that the states should still have the right to decide if they want to accept certain federal laws. This ended up with the idea of nullification, where the states would have the right to rule federal acts unconstitutional. The federal government denied states this right, and states felt that they were no longer respected. This caused the states to move towards secession.

Image: http://www.yankeerino.com/images/freetrade1.png

Election of 1860

Abraham Lincoln won the presidential election of 1850.  Although this was kind of a victory for the North, it enraged majority of the Southern population.  The North and South knew that Lincoln was going to try to outlaw slavery in the United States.  This started the secession of many slave states.  It started with South Carolina, then Mississippi, then many other Southern states.

Kansas-Nebraska Act

The Kansas and Nebraska territories would vote and decide whether or not to be a slave state.  This was against the Missouri Compromise that was just created a little while ago.  The deciding of this would create even more tension between the North and the South.  This broke the rule of all states

Picture: http://library.thinkquest.org/CR0215469/kansas1.gif

Missouri Compromise

Missouri wants to be a slave state. The north do  not want this, because that would make the equality of slave  vs. free states uneven.  They fix this by splitting New York into two states which creates the free state of Maine.  It stopped slavery in the Louisiana Territory north of the parallel 36,30 north with an exception of Missouri.  This was called the Missouri Comprimise.  The reason for this is because if there were more slave states than free states the slave states would have an advantage over voting and other things.

Image: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Missouri_Compromise

State's Rights

The reason for states'rights in the U.S was because they were afraid of a monarchy to take over their brand- new country.  This, in general, can create problems however.  If the states have too much power, then it makes it easy for them to rebel.  (each had their own army)  That is how the north and the south split up so easily.

Image: http://www.legendsofamerica.com/ah-civilwarcauses.html