Party Platforms and Black History Part V

Following the passage of Fugitive Slave Law and Kansas Nebraska Act some anti-slavery Democrats, along with other anti-slavery activists, formed a new party in 1854 – the Republican Party.

One of the founders of this new Republican Party was US Senator Charles Sumner. He promoted civil rights and desegregation of public schools.

In 1856 Sumner gave a two-day speech in the Senate against slavery, but he got carried away and mocked Andrew Butler, relative of Democrat Representative Preston Brooks, and vilified Stephen Douglas. Afterward, Brooks clubbed him down on the floor of the Senate with his cane and knocked him out, almost to the point of death. It took 3½ years before Sumner returned to the Senate and delivered another speech against slavery.

The South, however, declared Brooks a hero and made walking canes in his honor.

The 1856 Presidential elections pitted Republicans against Democrats for the first time. The Republican platform emphatically called for equality and civil rights for African Americans. The Democrat platform declared that abolitionists would lead to dangerous consequences and diminish happiness of the people.

In spite of being overtly pro-slavery, the Democrat Party won the presidency, and James Buchanan became president.

Soon, 1857, in the famous Dred Scott case, the Democratically controlled Supreme Court declared Blacks to be non persons, claiming they were property.

The unintended consequence of the Dred Scott decision was the Panic of 1857. Railroad builders had pushed westward because they were confident that it would be free. After the decision, east/west railroad bonds plummeted from the uncertainty that arose, causing the panic to spread throughout the Northern banking community.

In the1860 presidential election, the Republican platform condemned the Fugitive Slave Law and the Dred Scott decision. The Democratic platform, however, embraced both of these.

Republicans won the presidency, House and Senate for the first time. Southern Democrats, knowing that anti-slavery legislation was on its way, left Congress and took their states with them, forming a slaveholding ‘nation.’ Northern Democrats remained pro-slavery, but refused to secede.

The struggle between the North and South filled the next several years.

Fugitive Slave Law - Black History Part IV

After passing the Missouri Compromise, this Democratic Congress continued by enacting the Fugitive Slave Law of 1850 to require Northerners to return slaves who had escaped. It developed, however, into a means for Southerners to kidnap free Black citizens and take them south.

Out of fear of being captured, many (probably more than 20,000) free Black citizens fled to Canada. The Underground Railroad reached its peak during this time, aiding both slaves and free men to find a safe place to live.

After the Fugitive Slave Law, this same Congress expanded slavery by passing the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854. This Act essentially repealed the restrictions on slavery in the Missouri Compromise by allowing slavery to be introduced into parts of the territory where it was previously forbidden. Because the Kansas-Nebraska Territory was so large, it effectually pushed slavery from one coast to the other – opening the entire Louisiana Purchase to slavery.

In the end, this push to increase slave states and territory caused a split in the Democrat Party. Many hoped to reverse some of the damage by this Congress.