Events Leading Up to the Civil War

Gino Russo
5/30/11

There are three events that occurred which setup the conditions for the Civil War. With these situations, a lot of people got mad. First, there was the Three-Fifths Compromise. This compromise was the counting of southern black slaves as three-fifths of a white man. Southern states wanted to count blacks so they would have more votes in Congress. Northern states didn’t want blacks to be counted because blacks did not vote. Congress eventually passed the three-fifths compromise so that blacks would partially count towards the South's vote. Second, the Compromise of 1850 was the passing of five bills based on Clay's proposals. The Compromise was setup to please both the north and the south but later caused outrage in the north. Third, States' Rights was boosted when the republicans wanted to get rid of the Alien and Sedition Acts. The Republicans faced a problem when opposing the law because at that time, the Supreme Court didn't have the power to strike down a law as unconstitutional.
Congress agreed to a plan called the Three-Fifths Compromise. Each enslaved person would be counted as three fifths of a free person. With the compromise 500 enslaved people would count as 300 free people making this a gain for the south. The North had to agree on this to keep the South in the Union. The Three-Fifths Compromise preserved slavery in the new Constitution by making the distinction between “free persons” and “all other persons.” The North was still upset that the South had more votes.
The Compromise of 1850 was to help both the North and The South. President Zachary Taylor opposed the Compromise but soon died in 1850. Millard Fillmore, the new president supported the Compromise and signed it into law. To please the North, the Compromise was to end the crisis by giving both supporters and opponents of slavery