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On the night of October 16, 1859, Brown and a band of followers seized the federal arsenal at Harper’s Ferry, Virginia (now West Virginia), in what is believed to have been an attempt to arm a slave insurrection. (Brown denied this at his trial, but evidence indicated otherwise.) They were dislodged by a force of U.S. Marines led by Army lieutenant colonel Robert E. Lee.Brown was swiftly tried for treason against Virginia and hanged. Southern reaction initially was that his acts were those of a mad fanatic, of little consequence. But when Northern abolitionists made a martyr of him, Southerners came to believe this was proof the North intended to wage a war of extermination against white Southerners. Brown’s raid thus became a step on the road to war between the sections.

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In Kansas, particularly, violent clashes between proponents of the two ideologies occurred. One abolitionist in particular became famous—or infamous, depending on the point of view—for battles that caused the deaths of pro-slavery settlers in Kansas. His name was John Brown. Ultimately, he left Kansas to carry his fight closer to the bosom of slavery.

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Some abolitionists actively helped runaway slaves to escape via “the Underground Railroad,” and there were instances in which men, even lawmen, sent to retrieve runaways were attacked and beaten by abolitionist mobs. To the slave holding states, this meant Northerners wanted to choose which parts of the Constitution they would enforce, while expecting the South to honor the entire document. The most famous activist of the underground railroad was Harriet Tubman, a nurse and spy in the Civil War and known as the Moses of her people.

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Harriet Beecher Stowe‘s Uncle Tom’s Cabin

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Harriet Beecher Stowe‘s Uncle Tom’s Cabin

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Harriet Beecher Stowe’s anti-slavery novel Uncle Tom’s Cabins was published in serial form in an anti-slavery newspaper in 1851 and in book format in 1852. Within two years it was a nationwide and worldwide bestseller. Depicting the evils of slavery, it offered a vision of slavery that few in the nation had seen before. The book succeeded at its goal, which was to start a wave of anti-slavery sentiment across the nation. Upon meeting Stowe, President Lincoln remarked, “So you’re the little woman who wrote the book that started this great war.”

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In the early 1830's, those who wished to see that institution abolished within the United States were becoming more strident and influential. They claimed obedience to “higher law” over obedience to the Constitution’s guarantee that a fugitive from one state would be considered a fugitive in all states. The fugitive slave act along with the publishing of Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin helped expand the support for abolishing slavery nationwide.

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As a slave, Dred Scott sought citizenship through the American legal system. His case eventually ended up in the Supreme Court. His request was denied but it also overturned the Missouri Compromise of 1820, which had restricted slavery in certain U.S. territories.

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Starting with South Carolina, 11 states would leave to be the Confederate States of America.
Abe said no and sent troops down to stop them. The Civil War began.

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Abe became prez while he was member of the new anti-slavery Republican Party without even being on one ballot of the ten Southern states.

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Kansas was offered the option of whether or not they wanted slaves, people from both sides came to choose. Blood was spilled, hence the Bleeding Kansas, and the state ended up slave free.

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The South used slaves for farming, abolitionists such as John Brown, Frederick Douglass, Harriet Tubman, and Harriet Beecher Stowe found this wrong and started convincing many people this. The South became fearful for their way of life

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Southern states began to fear they would lose so much power that they would lose all their rights.

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The southern states felt that the federal government was taking away their rights and powers.

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The North didn't need slaves because they moved onto industries but the South continued using their slaves for farming.