This week we'll explore the great immigrant and emigrant migrations that shaped Antebellum America and the West. We will also look at the impacts of the Gold Rush and Mexican-American War.
Points of Entry:
Gold Rush -
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/goldrush/
Mexican-American War -
http://www.pbs.org/kera/usmexicanwar/index_flash.html
Overland Migration Trails -
http://overlandtrails.lib.byu.edu/trailmap.html
Irish Immigration -
http://www.latinamericanstudies.org/irish-immigrants.htm
Questions for discussion:
How did the Mexican-American War shape sectional divisions in the U.S.?
What is the relationship between the Gold Rush and the Civil War?
Taylor (chap. 19)
- The Mexican-American War heightened sectional divides by leaving the nation with the task of determining how to carve up the territory acquired from Mexico and whether or not the states would permit slavery. The northern states worried that the southern states would try to make the new territories into slave states. If the new states permitted slavery, the strength of southern planters would overwhelm that of northern industrialists and configure the future of the American economy to agrarianism and human bondage. Therefore, the North tried to slow down the admission of new states into they could work out a plan or model that would admit new states to the union in such a way that the number of slave and free states would balance out. This did much to upset southerners since the war had won at the cost of mostly southern blood.
ReplyDelete-The Gold Rush lead an increasing number of Americans to leave the Eastern United States and disperse into the newly acquired territories. As the people inhabiting the new territories demanded the title of statehood, the American government was strained in deciding whether to establish the states as free or not free. In a sense, the Gold Rush exacerbated sectional economic tensions and helped incite the Civil War as the North and South could no longer stand to cooperate over the expansion and limitation of slavery.
The Mexican American war resulted in the United States gaining the territories of Texas, New Mexico, and California. The expansion west was opposed by the Whig party because of thier anti-slavery views. The possibility the new states would be slave states was a political issue.. Gold was discovered in California and several immigrants came from abroad as well as different American states in search for wealth. The issue of slavery which was once a state concern became blurred in California. With such a mix of people, it could not be determined if California was a "slave state" or not. These arguments about slavery is what ultimately led to the Civil War.
ReplyDeleteThe Mexican-American War shaped sectional divisions in the U.S. by creating issues where decisions had to be made. The land that used to belong to Mexico brought up the question of how to divide it and the states had to decide whether or not they wanted to be slave states. Both the North and the South fought over the newly acquired territory since they didn't want to other to get it and take over.
ReplyDeleteThe Gold Rush created western expansion which created new states. These new states had to decide whether or not they wanted to be slave states. The Gold Rush made an already tense situation between the North and the South even worse until it became so tense that the Civil War broke out.