Use this Discovering American History video entitled The Coming Crisis The 1850's to study the sectional split between North and South that had been slowly developing since the Missouri Compromise. Learn about how Thomas Jefferson had called the question of slavery extension "a firebell in the night," and after the Mexican-American War the philosopher Ralph Waldo Emerson expressed the fear that "Mexico will poison us." Learn about how their deep concerns were realized as people in the North and South took ever more rigid and determined positions on slavery's extension or elimination, and how many Americans in the 1850's, perhaps a majority, felt the issue of slavery had to be permanently settled and expected their political parties to reflect their will.
Learn about The Coming Crisis - The 1850s