Gag Rule Dbq Analysis

At the Pinckney Committee, the “gag rule” was instated, immediately tabling antislavery petitions in the House of Representatives. (Doc C) The purpose of this was because all sides for once agreed that it was impossible to reach a compromise over the topic of slavery and brought “too much heat to the table”. This was the government ignoring the issues that slavery was bringing up, and as a result the situation sometimes became violent and rash. In a political cartoon known as “Southern Chivalry”, the caning of Senator Charles Sumner (Massachusetts) by Representative Preston Brooks (South Carolina) in the Senate is ridiculed and shows sympathy towards Sumner with men laughing in the background. (Doc E) J.L. Magee was speaking to the Northern audience through his cartoon, and showing just how “chivalrous” the southern men

(Doc B) The purpose of this report was to not only rile up abolitionists for the immediate emancipation of slaves but to also appeal to their audience that believed in God and morals. The abolition movement was gaining support fast, and no “gag rule” was enough to keep the issue out of politics. Meanwhile, by 1840, nearly 7 million Americans lived in the West. Most of these people had left their homes in the East in search of economic opportunity. The question of whether or not slavery would be allowed in the new western states dictated every conversation about the frontier. Henry Clay had created the Missouri Compromise, where the Louisiana Purchase was divided by 36°30' line. Anything above was a free state and anything below was a slave state; Missouri admitted as a slave state and Maine as a free state. The key to the compromise was the balance that was kept in the government. The balance that the Missouri Compromise had achieved was soon upset by interest in new territory, and the annexation of Texas and other Mexican territories did not become a political priority until James K Polk was