# data[].attributes.attachment_caption
A map depicting the area gained from the Mexican cession. the disputed area, and the new border following the Mexican-American War

# data[].attributes.body
Following the Mexican-American War, the United States of America annexed Texas and the area in the Mexican Cession. Prior to the war, the Missouri Compromise prevented slavery North of the line; however, the immense accumulation of land reanimated the debate regarding slavery. The Kansas-Nebraska Act and the Compromise of 1850 attempted to recontain the issue but were unsuccessful. The debate combined with existing differences between Northern and Southern states ultimately led to the Civil War.

# data[].attributes.body
In opposition to the spread of slavery, the Free Soil Party was formed. It was a third party that gained 10% of the vote using Van Buren as their candidate in 1848. They were unsuccessful; however, they managed to drive votes away from the Democratic Candidate, leading to the election of Zachary Taylor. In spite of losing votes in a later election, they gained power in the House of Representatives. The party condemned slavery as morally evil and represented the debate regarding slavery. It was this debate which ultimately began the Civil War.

# data[].attributes.body
Zachary Taylor was a Whig who served as president from 1849 to 1850. He was a U.S. Army veteran that led troops in the Mexican American War. Taylor fought against the expansion of slavery which led to South Carolina's threats to secede in 1850. Congress made the Compromise of 1850, but Taylor died prior to taking a position.

# data[].attributes.attachment_caption
An map of free and slave regions determined from the compromise

# data[].attributes.body
Following the acquisition of new territory, debates about slavery restarted. Henry Clay, a senate member, wrote the Compromise of 1850. The act called for California's admission as a free state, established a Texas boundary and governments for Utah and New Mexico, and amended the Fugitive Slave Law. The amendment to the Fugitive Slave Law required all states to arrest suspected slaves and anyone who helped free a slave was subject to a fine or imprisonment which led additional Northern animosity.

# data[].attributes.attachment_caption
A wanted poster for an escaped slave issuing a $200 reward

# data[].attributes.body
The Fugitive Slave Acts allowed for the recapture of escaped slaves and placed penalty upon anyone who assisted them. They were originally passed in 1793; however, they were amended in 1850 to placed additional provisions upon escaped slaves and inflict harsher penalties. The passing of the acts led to increased Northern animosity.

# data[].attributes.headline
Harriet Beecher Stowe's "Uncle Tom's Cabin" (1852)

# data[].attributes.subject
Harriet Beecher Stowe's "Uncle Tom's Cabin" (1852)

# data[].attributes.body
Stowe's book "Uncle Tom's Cabin" was a pro-abolition novel that depicted the life of a slave named Tom. The book became popular in the North; however, Southern states denounced and banned it. The book increased divide between the North and South as the North understood the inhumanity of slavery while the South brushed the book's content off as dramatizations.

# data[].attributes.attachment_caption
An image depicting Franklin Pierce, the 14th president

# data[].attributes.body
The North and South had become incredibly polarized. During the election of 1852, all existing candidates were unable to secure enough votes so a pro-slavery Northerner was selected to appease all sides: Franklin Pierce. Pierce became the fourteenth president and exacerbated pre-existing issues. He supported additional expansion and many believed he was trying to expand slavery. The impetus of ensuing violence resulted from his Kansas-Nebraska Act. Ultimately, Pierce's action increased animosity and fueled the erupting violence.

# data[].attributes.body
The Kansas-Nebraska Act was an 1854 bill that mandated "popular sovereignty," allowing settlers of a territory to decide whether slavery would be allowed within a new state's borders. The act passed by Pierce demonstrates the conflict prevalent in the country in addition to the attempts to fix it. In this scenario, Pierce's actions exacerbated the issues; specifically, rampant violence and fraud became ubiquitous in the territories in an attempt to skew the vote for slavery.

# data[].attributes.body
Anti-slavery Whigs and Democrats, Free Soilers, and reformers from the Northwest formed the Republican party in order to keep slavery out of the new territories. The formation primarily resulted from the Kansas-Nebraska Act. The party's first presidential candidate was Fremont; then in 1860, Lincoln was elected. The party illustrates continued arguing regarding slavery; however, it also demonstrates additional conflict as Southern states threatened to secede if a Republican candidate won the presidency.

# data[].attributes.body
Bleeding Kansas was the intense conflict that arose due to the Kansas-Nebraskan Act. Pro-slavery and anti-slavery settlers fought from 1855 to 1859, resulting in roughly 55 deaths. Pro-slavery settlers wished to secure Kansas as a slave state while free-state settlers wanted to ban slavery from the territory. Bleeding Kansas demonstrates continued escalation over the slavery debate.

# data[].attributes.body
The Caning of Charles Sumner, or the Brooks–Sumner Affair, occurred on May 22, 1856, in the United States Senate chamber, when Representative Preston Brooks, a pro-slavery Democrat from South Carolina, used a walking cane to attack Senator Charles Sumner, an abolitionist Republican from Massachusetts. The beating nearly killed Sumner and contributed significantly to the country's polarization over the issue of slavery. It has been considered symbolic of the "breakdown of reasoned discourse" and the use of violence that eventually led to the Civil War.

# data[].attributes.body
In a three-way election, Democrat James Buchanan defeated Republican nominee John C. Frémont and Know Nothing nominee Millard Fillmore. The main issue was the expansion of slavery as facilitated by the Kansas–Nebraska Act of 1854. By refusing to take a firm stand on either side of the slavery issue, Buchanan failed to resolve the question, leaving his nation's gravest crisis to his successor. Indeed, Buchanan's passivity is considered by most historians to have been a prime contributing factor in the coming of the Civil War.

# data[].attributes.body
Sandford did three important things: established that enslaved persons had no rights in federal court, declared that slave states no longer had to honor the "once free, always free" rule, and stated that Congress should never have prohibited slavery in the Wisconsin Territory. The Sandford versus Dred Scott case articulated the clear power slavery held within the union, attacking existing anti-slavery structures and reinforcing the theories about the government being controlled by pro-slavery congressmen. The Supreme Court's ruling was eventually overturned by the 13th and 14th amendments; however, the case demonstrates the clear racial bias prevalent in the nation and brought out additional animosity.

# data[].attributes.body
The Lecompton Constitution was the second of four proposed constitutions for Kansas. The document was pro-slavery and when the citizens of Kansas voted between the Topeka and Lecompton constitution, ample fraud was prevalent. It contained clauses protecting slaveholding, a bill of rights excluding free African Americans, and it added to the frictions leading up to the U.S. Civil War. The constitution demonstrates the conflict between abolition and pro-slavery movements and the ongoing effects of the Kansas-Nebraska act which inadequately dealt with the issue of slavery.

# data[].attributes.body
On October 16, 1859, abolitionist John Brown led 21 men down the road to Harpers Ferry in what is today West Virginia. The plan was to take the town's federal armory and, ultimately, ignite a nationwide uprising against slavery. The raid failed, but six years later, Brown's dream was realized and slavery became illegal. Brown's actions once again relate to the Kansas-Nebraska Act and he serves as an exemplar of the violent protests which defined the ongoing conflict that brought forth the Civil War.

# data[].attributes.body
A former Whig, Lincoln ran on a political platform opposed to the expansion of slavery in the territories. Lincoln won the Electoral College with less than 40 percent of the popular vote nationwide by carrying states above the Mason–Dixon line and north of the Ohio River, plus the states of California and Oregon in the Far West. His election served as the immediate impetus for the outbreak of the Civil War. After being sworn in as president, Lincoln refused to accept any resolution that would result in Southern secession from the Union.

# data[].attributes.body
Within the end of the year 1860, South Carolina became the first state to succeed from the Union. The state had been threatening secession years prior, but Lincoln's election catalyzed their departure. The dissolution of the union forced movements to reform the unity; the reunification combined with ongoing antagonisms sparked the Civil War.

# data[].attributes.body
Crittenden Compromise was an unsuccessful proposal of Crittenden's to permanently preserve slavery in the United States Constitution, thereby making it unconstitutional for future congresses to end slavery. It was a final attempt to prevent war; however, the radicality of the compromise caused it to fail, and combined with ongoing conflict led to the Civil War.