CALIFORNIA: A HISTORY PART.

2- "THE FIGHT FOR SLAVERY IN

CALIFORNIA", BY JAMES M. MCPHERSON

BY: TWYLA GOLLERY

THE DILEMMA

As a result of the Mexican-American war, the U.S. expanded by a third.

This put into question whether this new territory would be a free one or if people could have slaves there

It also put into question which people had the rights to allow this issue to go one way or the other

Both Southerners and Northerners argued why having slaves or not having slaves would be better in California particularly

SLAVERY: GOOD OR BAD FOR CALIFORNIA

With the discovery of gold in California, people from around the world traveled there for a chance to become rich

Gold miners decided among themselves that if slaves were allowed into California they would have to compete with them for the gold.

Some of the southerners had brought with them their slaves, and they believed that slaves were the most productive way to mine gold

A FREE STATE

Once California was announced as a free state in the 1850's, the south became desperate to find another slave state to offset California

The filibusters tried to invade other places such as Cuba and Baja California

None of their efforts had any success

The South also lost their campaign to make Kansas a slave state

While this was going on Minnesota and Oregon became free sates

THE FILIBUSTERERS

People who wanted slavery and still persisted even after California was announced a free state were known as filibusterers

The word filibuster comes from the Spanish word filibustero, which means that unusual tactics are used to prevent the adoption of a measure that is favored by most

In this case the filibusterers fought still for slavery in California