The Path to War?
The Seriate Slide Cabinet in the American Museum's Waxworks room conveys the events of the 1850s that brought tensions between North and South to a boiling point. For this activity, students will have to work collaboratively to create a written explanation of the slide show for a foreign visitor to the American Museum who doesn’t know about the events shown in the slides or their significance.
Historical Context
Between 1820 and 1860, the extent and speed
of westward expansion raised unsettling questions about slavery and
race in American society. Would the new western territories come into
the Union as free or slave states? What would happen to the balance
of power between free and slave states in the U.S. Senate? Who would
control the land in the West: slaveholding planters, capitalist entrepreneurs,
or pioneer farmers and workers? But it was not only westward expansion
and development that pushed slavery to center stage in American life.
Slavery became a key moral and emotional issue after 1830 because
of the growing resistance of slaves themselves and the militancy of
black and white abolitionists. For forty years, political leaders
in the nation’s two major parties, the Whigs and Democrats,
tried first to avoid the slavery issue, then to reach a compromise.
But by 1860, the raw emotions dividing the sides left little room
for compromise.
Themes
abolition, western expansion, free labor, slavery, sectionalism
Objectives
Students will:
1) Explain how events after the Compromise of 1850 and the Dred Scott decision in 1857 contributed to increasing sectional polarization. [Analyze cause-and-effect relationships] (National History Standards, Era 5, Standard 1A)
2) Explain the causes of the Civil War and evaluate the importance of slavery as a principal cause of the conflict. [Compare competing historical narratives] (National History Standards, Era 5, Standard 1A)
3) Evaluate alternative
courses of action and formulate a position or course of action on
an issue (National History Standards, Standards
of Historical Thinking, 5)
Assessment: 250 word written description; class discussion
Materials
- Seriate Slide Cabinet from the Waxworks Room
- Documents and images from the Sectional Crisis, John Brown, and Uncle Tom's Cabin Archives
ACTIVITY
Step 1:
The entire class should review the seriate slide cabinet slide show
in the Waxworks Room. For this activity, students will have to create
a written explanation of the slides for a foreign visitor to the American
Museum who doesn’t know about the events shown in the slides
or their significance.
Step 2:
Divide the class into eight pairs or small groups and assign each
group one of the following slides: Compromise of 1850/Fugitive Slave
Law; Uncle Tom’s Cabin published; Bloody Kansas; Rep. Brooks
Attacks Sen. Sumner; Dred Scott case; John Brown’s Raid on Harpers
Ferry; 1860 presidential election; Secession. Each pair/group should
closely analyze their assigned slide and take notes about it.
Step 3:
Students should investigate other sources for explanations of what
their slide means. This should include reading the primary documents,
images, headnotes, and essays in the Archive that relate to their
slide; their textbook; and other online resources if necessary. Students
should take notes about how these primary and secondary sources help
to explain the event depicted on the slide, and if they offer contradictory
interpretations of that event.
Step 4 (Assessment):
Working together and using their notes, the pairs/groups should write
a 250 word explanation of their slide for a foreigner visiting the
American Museum.
Step 5 (Class Discussion):
One member of every pair/group should read their written explanation
to the class. Teachers can use these readings as the basis for a class
discussion about the events of the 1850s; this discussion might include
comparing students’ interpretations of events with the interpretations
of historians, or considering whether any alternatives to Civil War
might have been possible.
