REVIEW & RELATE

CHAPTER 12 REVIEW

  1. Why did Americans go west in the 1830s and 1840s, and what was the journey like?

  2. What groups competed for land and resources in the West? How did disease, drought, and violence shape this competition?

  3. What steps did legislators take in the 1840s and early 1850s to resolve the issue of the expansion of slavery? Were they successful?

  4. How were slavery and American imperialist ambitions intertwined in the 1840s and 1850s?

  5. What factors contributed to the spread of antislavery sentiment in the North beyond committed abolitionists?

  6. How did the violence in Kansas and the Dred Scott decision reflect and intensify the growing sectional divide within the nation?

  7. How and why did John Brown’s raid on Harpers Ferry move the country closer to civil war?

  8. Why did many in the South believe that the election of Abraham Lincoln was cause for secession?