Political

• The Compromise of  1850
• The Clay Compromise Measures
• "This is among John C. Calhoun's most famous speeches. He was too ill to deliver it himself, so it was read by another senator with Calhoun present in the Senate Chamber. Calhoun, so ill he had to be helped out of the Chamber after the speech by two of his friends, died on March 31, 1850."
• Charles Sumner, On the Crime Against Kansas, 1856
• Republican Platform 1856
• Democratic Platform 1860 (Douglas Faction)
• Democratic Platform 1860 (Breckinridge Faction)
• Republican Platform 1860
• A Hard Shove for a "Nation On the Brink": The Impact of Dred Scott
• U.S. Government Sources on Presidents

• John Brown's Final Address to the Court, November 2, 1859

• California Gold:  The Diary and Letters of James M. Burr, 1850-1853
• Excerpts from : Henry Carey, The Slave Trade, Domestic and Foreign. (1853)

Social Problems

• Frederick Douglass, 1817-1895, Autobiography
• National Underground Railroad Freedom Center

Abolitionism

• Africans in America Part 4: Abolitionism
• Abolitionism: 1830-1850
• American Abolitionism Project
• "I Will Be Heard! Abolitionism in America

Intellectual and Cultural

• Frederick Douglass, 1817-1895, Autobiography
• An American Family: The Beecher Tradition
• The Autobiography of John Parker
Parker was born in 1827 in Norfolk, Virginia. His father was apparently a wealthy white man; his mother a slave like Parker. He spent the first 18 years of his life as a slave, earning himself a reputation as a troublemaker. In 1845 he purchased his freedom. He was married to Miranda Boulden of Cincinnati in 1848 (she is rarely mentioned, never by name, in the autobiography), and moved to Ripley, Ohio the next year. He and Miranda had six children together (two of whom,inheriting their father's intelligence, went on to study at Oberlin College).It was in Ripley, a hotbed of abolitionist activity, that his work on the Underground Railroad began and flourished. By his own count, he helped over 400 slaves to freedom. By day, however, Parker was a successful businessman; in 1865 he purchased an iron foundry, and he patented several popular inventions.

• American Westward Migration

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