Politicians
A successful lawyer and politician of the Republican Party, and he became the 16th President of the United States.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
The law that established the territories of Nebraska and Kansas, giving them popular sovereignty over slavery in their states.
KANSAS-NEBRASKA ACT
A conductor of the Underground Railroad and was successful in helping about 300 slaves escape to freedom.
HARRIET TUBMAN
The name given to the Kansas territory because of the civil war that erupted between proslavery and antislavery settlers
BLEEDING KANSAS
A system in which residents vote to decide on an issue.
POPULAR SOVEREIGNTY
A Supreme Court Chief Justice who overlooked Dred Scott’s case and ruled that slaves did not have the rights of citizens.
ROGER B. TANEY
A series of resolutions intended to settle the disagreements between free states and slave states.
COMPROMISE OF 1850
An abolitionist who believed he was chosen by God to fight slavery. He was responsible for the Pottawatomie Massacre.
JOHN BROWN
A novel that portrayed the message that slavery was a moral struggle.
UNCLE TOM’S CABIN
The formal withdrawal of a state from the Union
SECESSION
An Illinois senator who successfully passed the Compromise of 1850.
STEPHEN A. DOUGLAS
Laws that banned the imprisonment of runaway slaves and guaranteed them jury trials.
PERSONAL LIBERTY LAWS
A slave from Missouri who filed a lawsuit for freedom after his slave owner passed away. He argued that he gained freedom by living in a free territory for years.
DRED SCOTT
A secret network of free African Americans and white abolitionists who helped slaves escape to free states.
UNDERGROUND RAILROAD
The idea that any territory could exclude slavery by refusing to pass laws supporting it.
FREEPORT DOCTRINE
The 13th president of the United States who supported the Compromise of 1850.
MILLARD FILMORE
A law under the Compromise of 1850 in which slaves that escaped from the slave states must be returned.
FUGITIVE SLAVE ACT
An abolitionist who wrote and published Uncle Tom’s Cabin.
HARRIET BEECHER STOWE
A town in Virginia where John Brown aimed to give slaves weapons to start a slave uprising.
HARPERS FERRY
A proposal suggesting that slavery would not be allowed in California, Utah, and New Mexico
WILMOT PROVISO