20 min listen
Lecture 6 - Expansion and Slavery: Legacies of the Mexican War and the Compromise of 1850
FromHIST 119: The Civil War and Reconstruction Era, 1845-1877
Lecture 6 - Expansion and Slavery: Legacies of the Mexican War and the Compromise of 1850
FromHIST 119: The Civil War and Reconstruction Era, 1845-1877
ratings:
Length:
20 minutes
Released:
Aug 18, 2017
Format:
Podcast episode
Description
In this lecture, Professor Blight discusses some of the conflicts, controversies, and compromises that led up to the Civil War. After analyzing Frederick Douglass's 1852 Fourth of July speech and the inherent conflict between American slavery and American freedom, the lecture moves into a lengthy discussion of the war with Mexico in the 1840s. Professor Blight explains why northerners and southerners made "such a fuss" over the issue of slavery's expansion into the western territories. The lecture ends with the crisis over California's admission to statehood and the Compromise of 1850. TranscriptLecture Page
Released:
Aug 18, 2017
Format:
Podcast episode
Titles in the series (27)
Lecture 1 - Introductions: Why Does the Civil War Era Have a Hold on American Historical Imagination?: Professor Blight offers an introduction to the course. He summarizes some of the course readings, and discusses the organization of the course. Professor Blight offers some thoughts on the nature of history and the study of history, before moving into a discussion of the reasons for Americans' enduring fascination with the Civil War. The reasons include: the human passion for epics, Americans' fondness for redemption narratives, the Civil War as a moment of "racial reckoning," the fascination with loss and lost causes, interest in military history, and the search for the origins of the modern United States. Transcript Lecture Page by HIST 119: The Civil War and Reconstruction Era, 1845-1877