Republican Party
A new political party organized as a protest against the Kansas-Nebraska Act
Democratic Party
The political party that was deeply divided by Douglas' Kansas-Nebraska Act
Missouri Compromise
The sectional agreement of 1820, repealed by the Kansas-Nebraska Act
The Gadsden Purchase
Southwestern territory acquired by the Pierce administration to facilitate a southern transcontinental railroad
Ostend Manifesto
A top-secret dispatch, drawn up by American diplomats in Europe, that detailed a plan for seizing Cuba from Spain
Clayton-Bulwer Treaty
An agreement between Britain and America concerning any future Central American canal
Whigs
Political party that fell apart and disappeared after losing the election of 1852
Compromise of 1850
A series of agreements between North and South that temporarily dampened the slavery controversy and led to a short-lived era of national good feelings
Free Soil Party
Third-party entry in the election of 1848 that opposed slavery epansion and prepared the way for the Republican party
Fugitive Slave Law
The provision of the Compromise of 1850 that comforted southern slave-catchers and aroused the wrath of northern abolitionists
Higher Law
Senator William Seward's doctrine that slavery should be excluded from the territories as a contrary to a divine moral law standing above even the Constitution
Underground Railroad
The informal network that conducted runaway slaves from the South to Canada
Mason-Dixon Line
The boundary line between slave and free states in the East, originially the southern border of Pennsylvania
popular sovereignty
The doctrine that the issue of slavery should be decided by the residents of a territory themselves, not by the federal government
fire-eaters
Hotheaded southern agitators who pushed for southern interests and favored secession from the Union
Stephen A. Douglas
Illinois polotician who helped smooth over sectional conflict in 1850 but then reignited it in 1854
Tokugawa Shogunate
The ruling warrior dynasty of Japan with whom Matthew Perry negotiated the Treaty of Kanagawa of 1854
Cuba
Rich Spanish colony coveted by American proslavery expansionists in the 1850s
Matthew Perry
American naval commander who opened Japan to the West in 1854
Nicaragua
Central American nation desired by pro-slavery expansionists in the 1850s
Winfield Scott
Military hero of the Mexican War who became the Whigs' last presidential candidate in 1852
Franklin Pierce
Weak Democratic president whose pro-southern cabinet pushed aggressive expansionists schemes
China
Nation whose 1844 treaty with the United States opened the door to a flood of American missionaries
William Seward
New york senator who argued that the expansion of slavery was forbidden by a "higher law.
Daniel Webster
Northern spokesman whose support for the Compromise of 1850 earned him the hatred of abolitionists
Caleb Cushing
American diplomat who negotiated the Treaty of Wanghia with China in 1844
California
Acquired from Mexico in 1848 and admitted as a free state in 1850 without ever having been a territory
Zachary Taylor
Whig president who nearly destroyed the Compromise of 1850 before he died in office
Lewis Cass
Democratic presidential candidate in 1848, original proponent of the idea of "popular sovereignty.
Harriet Tubman
Famous "conductor" on the Underground Railroad who rescued more than three hundred slaves from bondage