Covers significant events that took place in the year 1848, including the end of the Mexican-American War with the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, the rises to fame of Frederick Douglass and Henry David Thoreau, the Seneca Falls Convention, and the beginning of the California gold rush.

1. A SURVEY OF
AMERICAN HISTORY
Unit 2: Westward Expansion and Civil War
Part 13: The Watershed Year of 1848

2. PREPARING FOR
WAR WITH MEXICO
• Polk intended to acquire
California from Mexico. He
wanted the United States to
possess San Francisco Bay to
increase trade with Asia.
• He sent diplomats to Mexico to
negotiate the purchase of
California, but Mexico refused
to negotiate until it received
compensation for Texas.
• In response, Polk sent troops to
the Rio Grande, under the
leadership of Colonel Zachary
Taylor, and prepared for war...

3. MANIFEST DESTINY
• What Polk and many others
believed in was an idea now
known as ‘Manifest Destiny.’
That phrase was coined in 1845
as America and Britain resolved
the Oregon Territory dispute.
• At that time, the journalist John
O’Sullivan declared that it was
the “manifest destiny” of the
United States “to overspread
and to possess the whole of the
continent which Providence has
given us for the development of
the great experiment of liberty
and federated self-government
entrusted to us.”

4. MANIFEST DESTINY
• Manifest Destiny is the idea
that the United States and its
political institutions have won
the special favor of God, and
that the nation therefore has a
holy mission to extend its
virtues across the continent.
• Closely related to Manifest
Destiny is the idea of American
exceptionalism. This idea
suggests that, although it is
morally wrong for one country
to invade another and displace
its people, America is allowed
to be an exception to this rule
because it has a divine duty.

5. WARTIME SUPPORT
AND DISSENT
• On the whole, as war broke out,
the Democratic Party supported
it while the Whigs opposed it.
• By this time, the Democrats
were essentially the party of the
slaveholding Southern states.
Their support came from the
possibility of acquiring territory
that would add more slave
states to the Union.
• Whig abolitionists opposed the
war on the grounds that it was
unprovoked and, often, on the
grounds that it was a means of
extending American slavery.

6. FREDERICK
DOUGLASS
• Born into slavery on a Maryland
plantation in 1818 and escaped
sometime in the 1830s.
• Published Narrative of the Life of
Frederick Douglass in 1845,
detailing his experiences with his
abusive master, Mr. Covey, and
his escape to freedom via the
secret nationwide network of
abolitionists who formed the
‘underground railroad’ to shelter
runaway slaves as they made
their way to the North.
• Caused a sensation with his
beautiful prose style and oratory,
and became an outspoken and
influential abolitionist leader.

7. HENRY DAVID
THOREAU
• Philosopher and naturalist who
opposed the war because he
was also an abolitionist.
• Author of Civil Disobedience, in
which he discussed his reaction
to the outbreak of the war.
• Was jailed for not paying taxes.
• Refused to pay taxes as long as
they funded the war.
• Developed a means of political
action now known as ‘passive
resistance,’ blocking day-to-day
governance via withdrawal and
non-participation.

8. THE TREATY OF
GUADALUPE HIDALGO
• The peace treaty that ended the
Mexican-American War in 1848,
after eighteen months of battle.
• Mexico signed the treaty after
Zachary Taylor’s men defeated
the Mexican Army and
conquered Mexico City.
• Mexico ceded all or part of
present-day Texas, Colorado,
New Mexico, Utah, Arizona,
Nevada, and California, territory
known as the Mexican Cession.
• The Whigs opposed it for its
expansionary effects.

9. THE MEXICAN CESSION OF 1848

10. THE CALIFORNIA
GOLD RUSH
• In early 1848, only two weeks
before the end of the Mexican-
American War, gold was
discovered in California.
• The gold immediately attracted
migrants from Oregon, and
soon attracted migrants from
overseas, particularly China.
• In 1849, the first real year of the
gold rush, about 90,000 people
arrived in California. By 1855,
this figure was 200,000. Of the
first immigrants, only a few were
Chinese. By 1852, however, the
Chinese numbered 20,000.

11. ELIZABETH CADY
STANTON
• Outspoken abolitionist and
women’s rights advocate.
• Fought for women’s suffrage
as well as parental rights,
employment rights, property
ownership rights, divorce rights,
and birth control rights.
• Co-ordinated the Seneca Falls
convention in upstate New York
in 1848, the first organized
women’s suffrage movement in
the United States.
• Drafted the Declaration of
Rights and Sentiments, the key
document of the convention.

12. THE SENECA FALLS
CONVENTION (1848)
• Attended by three hundred
people, men and women.
• Resulted in the drafting of the
Declaration of Rights and
Sentiments, signed by 68
women and 32 men.
• The Declaration of Rights and
Sentiments is based on the
Declaration of Independence,
copying much of the language
word for word and recasting
King George III as male
authority figures in general.
• Called for the immediate
enfranchisement of women.

13. HOW TO DIVIDE THE
NEW TERRITORY?
• Following the Mexican Cession
and the acquisition of vast new
territory by the United States,
the nation faced the question of
whether the territory should be
carved up into free states or
slave states or some of both.
• Creating an equal number of
free states and slave states
was essential for preserving
the Congressional balance of
power between the north and
the south, but of course the free
states wanted more free states
and the slave states did not...

14. THE WHIGS
RETURN TO POWER
• Following Polk’s single term in
office, the Whigs were eager to
reclaim the Presidency in 1849.
• To do that, they drafted Polk’s
own most celebrated military
strategist, Zachary Taylor, as
their candidate.
• Taylor ignored the Whig Party
policy platform and lasted only
a year in office, dying suddenly
of an unknown ailment brought
on by eating bad food.
• Taylor was replaced by his
Vice President, Millard Fillmore.

15. A SURVEY OF
AMERICAN HISTORY
Unit 2: Westward Expansion and Civil War
Part 13: The Watershed Year of 1848