Compromises
Key Vocabulary
Legal Battles
People & Leaders
Escalating Tensions
100

This 1820 agreement was created to maintain a balance of power in the Senate by admitting one slave state and one free state.

What is the Missouri Compromise?

100

This term describes the status of a state where slavery was banned by law.

Free State

100

The Supreme Court used this "status" to explain why Dred Scott had no right to sue in federal court.

He was not a citizen

100

This "Great Compromiser" authored the plan that admitted California as a free state and passed a stricter fugitive slave law.

Henry Clay

100

This was the primary reason political leaders fought to keep an equal number of free and slave states.

To maintain equal representation/voting power in Congress

200

This specific latitude line was established to limit the future expansion of slavery in the Louisiana Territory.

36 30

200

This political concept allowed the residents of a territory to ignore the Missouri Compromise and decide the slavery issue themselves.

Popular Sovereignty

200

John Brown’s raid targeted a federal arsenal in this Virginia town to obtain weapons for a specific purpose.

Harpers Ferry


200

This Senator argued that the best way to settle the slavery dispute in the West was through popular sovereignty.

Stephen Douglas

200

This 1852 novel caused many Northerners to view slavery as a moral cruelty rather than just a political issue.

Uncle Tom's Cabin

300

This 1850 law was the most controversial part of the compromise because it forced Northerners to participate in the slave system.

The Fugitive Slave Act

300

This is the formal act of a state withdrawing from the Union, which South Carolina did first.

Secession

300

According to the Dred Scott decision, the Supreme Court ruled that Congress did not have the power to ban slavery in these areas.

What are territories?

300

While running for the Senate in 1858, this man argued that the nation could not remain "half slave and half free."

Abraham Lincoln

300

This religious movement in the early 1800s encouraged many Americans to view the abolition of slavery as "the Lord’s work"

What is the Second Great Awakening?

400

As part of the Compromise of 1850, this city saw the end of the slave trade, though slavery itself remained legal there.

Washington, D.C.

400

This 1787 law was the first time the U.S. government took a stand by banning slavery in a specific region.

The Northwest Ordinance

400

John Brown hoped his raid would spark this specific type of mass uprising among enslaved people.

A slave rebellion (or revolt)

400

What was the name of the newspaper Douglass was the leader of?

The North Star

400

Before the Missouri Compromise, the U.S. tried to keep this exact balance between free and slave states to maintain equal power in the Senate.

What is 11 free states and 11 slave states?

500

This 1854 Act led to the formation of a new political party (The Republicans) dedicated to stopping the spread of slavery.

The Kansas-Nebraska Act

500

This term refers to the United States as a single, joined country—the very thing compromises tried to save.

The Union

500

Final Jeopardy (Using what you have learned over the year) This concept justified territorial growth as both unavoidable and beneficial, yet it intensified political debates by linking expansion to the balance between free and slave states.

What is Manifest Destiny?

500

 Daily Double: This term refers to decisions made to reduce immediate conflict, often giving partial satisfaction to both sides, while allowing deeper disagreements to continue growing.

What is a compromise?

500

This group used newspapers, speeches, and books to push for the immediate end of slavery and helped turn it into a moral issue in the North.

Who are abolitionists?

M
e
n
u