Unit 5 SAQ (Slavery Between 1844-1865) Answers

APUSH Short Answer Question Answers for Slavery Between 1844-1865

👋 Welcome to the APUSH Unit 5 SAQ (Slavery Between 1844-1865) Answers. Have your responses handy as you go through the rubrics to see how you did!

⏱ Remember, the AP US History exam has a mixture of free-response questions and allotted times. For these types of questions, there will be 3 SAQs, and you will be given 40 minutes to complete the SAQ section. (This means you should give yourself ~13 minutes to go through each practice SAQ.)

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Figure 1

Image courtesy of Library of Congress, 1856.

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Questions with Answers & Rubric

(a) Describe ONE point of view about slavery expressed in the image above. 

🏆 Successful answers would explain how:

• Democratic politicians such as Stephen Douglas were looking to allow slavery to spread by incorporating popular sovereignty in the Louisiana Territory.
• The new free-soil party created after the Mexican Cession was offended by the push to allow popular sovereignty in the territories of the Missouri Compromise.
• The belief that the Democratic party wished to expand slavery in more territories such as Mexico and Cuba, causing more tension and deepening the sectionalist divide.
• The belief that Buchanan’s party wished to allow the spread of slavery and supported its extension.  

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(b) Briefly explain how ONE specific historical event or development during the period 1844 to 1865 that led to the event depicted in the image above. 

🏆 Successful answers would explain how:

• The Mexican American War had ended and popular sovereignty was implemented during the time to settle disputes between anti-slavery and pro-slavery forces.
• Bleeding Kansas had left many dead as pro-slavery and anti-slavery forces clashed over the expansion of slavery in Kansas.
• Following the Mexican American War, sectionalism over the spread of slavery began to heighten and new parties developed as a result.
• The growing abolitionist movement opposed the spread of slavery and campaigned against its existence.
• Southern states desired to add more slave states in order to maintain a balance in Congress.
• The Compromise of 1850 had allowed popular sovereignty to exist in some newly gained territories and supporters of slavery pushed for that in the territories above the 36’30” line.

📄 Additional Resources:

• Study Guide: Toward the Civil War & Reconstruction (1848-1877)

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(c) Briefly explain how ONE specific historical event or development during the period 1844 to 1865 resulted from the event depicted in the image above.

🏆 Successful answers would explain how:

• Abraham Lincoln led the Republican party following the event and would campaign against the spread of slavery in any new territories.
• John Brown led a raid on Harper’s Ferry in an attempt to eliminate slavery in Virginia as a result of the movement to allow slavery to exist or spread.
• Buchanan won the election of 1856 and tension over slavey continued to mount between Democrats, Free-Soliers and Republicans.
• The Civil War would result following Lincoln’s election in 1860 and slavery would later be abolished.
• The Dred Scott case occurred and prohibited any U.S. territory from preventing the existence of slavery.
• The Whig party would soon collapse with many of its members supporting Democrats or Republicans.

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Next Steps

• 🧠 Want to continue reinforcing your knowledge of Unit 5? Check out Unit 5 Trivia, either as a document or as a game.
• ⏭ Ready to move on to the next topic? Take a look at the collection of Unit 6 Resources.
• • 📚 Want to review multiple units? Check out all of the APUSH SAQs, LEQs, and DBQs.