The Election of 1860

In class, we were told to answer the question: " How were the results of the Election of 1860 representative of the deep divisions  over slavery?", and show how we got that answer in an educreations video made in small groups. After watching the John Green Crash Course Video about the Election of 1860 and what issues were going on at the time such as the Fugitive Slave law, (which meant that no matter where you were in the country if you found a fugitive slave you had to turn them in), and Bleeding Kansas (which is the nickname for a period of violence over the Kansas- Nebraska act of 1854, because it went against the Missouri Compromise). As seen in the photo below, the election split the country into groups depending on which of the candidates they agreed with. Abraham Lincoln was strictly against slavery, where his opponent Stephen Douglas tried to hide his bias by suggesting that they let it be the peoples' choice, then John Bell and John Beckenridge were both opposed to getting rid of slavery. As shown in the photo, since the anti-slavery states were some of the largest Lincoln was almost guaranteed a spot behind the desk in the Oval Office, which he did eventually obtain. Next, we got our information and photos to analyze from Civil War and Art, among our own sources.