American History Series: Search for Gold Drives Settlers to the West
After the first settlers in Colorado reported finding gold, the rush was on. Many people never found riches, but they stayed to become farmers or storekeepers. Transcript of radio broadcast:
27 May 2009
Welcome to the MAKING OF A NATION – American history in VOA Special English.
As we reported in our last program, slavery supporters failed to push through Congress a bill to make Kansas a slave state. Congress, instead, let the people of Kansas vote on the statehood constitution written by pro-slavery men. The people rejected the constitution. And slavery supporters gave up the fight for Kansas.
Here are Steve Ember and Bob Doughty to continue the story.
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VOICE ONE:
The problem of slavery continued to divide the North and South. Northerners warned that slavery could spread no farther. Southerners threatened to leave the Union unless southern rights were protected.
In the far West, one could forget this bitter dispute. There were no slaves in the West. The land and the weather were not right for the kind of farming that used slaves.
VOICE TWO:
An engraving showing miners in the Gregory area of Colorado in 1859
An engraving of miners in the Gregory area of Colorado in 1859
The west was growing quickly. Gold had brought thousands of settlers to California ten years earlier. New discoveries of gold and silver now were leading men to Colorado, Arizona and Nevada.
“Don’t go,” warned the New York Tribune, “if you have a job or a farm. But if you have neither,” it said, “and can get fifty dollars, then go to Colorado.”
There were many men without jobs or farms in the summer of eighteen-fifty-eight. The country had suffered a serious economic depression the year before, and jobs were difficult to find. Thousands left cities in the east.
The first ones to reach Colorado reported that gold was easy to find. They said any man who worked hard could find five to ten dollars worth of gold a day, and sometimes even more.
VOICE ONE:
The thousands who rushed to Colorado soon found that there was not as much gold as expected. The valuable metal became harder to find. No longer could it be washed from the bottoms of mountain streams. Men had to dig into the mountains of rock to get it. Huge digging machines and crushers were needed to get the gold from the rock. These machines were expensive. Few men had enough money to buy them.
Some of the miners organized companies. They borrowed money from eastern banks or sold shares of their companies. In a few years, almost all of the gold from Colorado came from the mining companies.
VOICE TWO:
Many of those who went west to search for gold stayed to become farmers or storekeepers. Others moved farther west to find gold in Nevada or California. Some cleared the ground of trees and cut them into wood for houses. Such timber from the forests of Oregon and Washington was sold in California and Mexico, even in China and Hawaii.
A few men recognized the need for transportation across the nation. Engineers planned four railroads. But northern and southern leaders could not agree on which one to build first. Until a railroad could be built, supplies were carried west in wagons pulled by horses or oxen.
Three men — Russell, Majors, and Waddell — formed a transportation company in eighteen fifty-five to carry government supplies to soldiers in the West. They started with five hundred wagons. Three years later, the company had three thousand five hundred wagons and forty thousand oxen.
VOICE ONE:
Getting letters to and from the west was not easy in the eighteen fifties. Ships brought mail to San Francisco two times a month. And once each month, mail would arrive in California after a slow trip by wagon from Saint Louis, Missouri.
The federal government decided to send mail overland two times a week to California. It gave the job of carrying the letters to a new company — the Overland Mail Company.
The mail was carried by train or boat to St. Louis. Then it was put on overland company stage coaches — light wagons pulled by four or six horses. The company was told to take the mail along a four-thousand-kilometer southern route through Arkansas, Texas, New Mexico and Arizona. The mail arrived in Los Angeles twenty-four days after it left St. Louis.
VOICE TWO:
There was a shorter way across the country. But the postal chief was a southerner, A. V. Brown. He believed stage coach travel might lead the way for a railroad. And he wanted a southern railroad to California. Brown said the southern route was the only one that could be kept open in all seasons. He said the other routes would be closed by snow in winter.
The overland stage coaches were large enough to carry four passengers. But not many people went to California in the coaches. The coaches never stopped for very long — only to change horses or drivers. And there were not many places to eat. Also, the trip was dangerous, because of hostile Indians.
VOICE ONE:
The shortest distance between Missouri and California was across the central part of the country. The Russell, Majors and Waddell Company decided to show that this central route could be used all year. It began a speedy mail service called the Pony Express.
Letters were carried by riders on fast horses. Stations with fresh horses were built about twenty-four kilometers apart, all along the way. A rider would change horses at each station until he had traveled one hundred twenty kilometers. Then he would give his letters to another rider. In this way, the letters would be carried between California and Missouri. The first letters sent by Pony Express from California took ten days to reach Missouri.
The Pony Express lasted only eighteen months. It was no longer needed after a telegraph line was completed to San Francisco.
VOICE TWO:
As communications and transportation improved, the government was able to increase its control over the West. But closer ties were not welcomed between the government and a religious group known as the Mormons.
The Mormon religion was started by a young New England man named Joseph Smith. In eighteen-twenty-three, at the age of eighteen, Smith claimed that an Angel told him of a golden book. He said the book contained God’s words to the ancient people of America. Smith said he was able to read the strange writing in this book and put it into English. He called this work the Book of Mormon.
VOICE ONE:
He organized a church and made himself its leader. Many people became Mormons. They believed themselves to be a special people chosen by God. Mormons worked hard. They helped each other and shared with those in need.
People who did not agree with the beliefs of the Mormons did not like them. Trouble developed between Mormons and other people. Joseph Smith was forced to move his people from New York to Ohio and then to Missouri.
The Mormons seemed finally to have found a home in Illinois. They built their own town and called it Nauvoo. They governed themselves and had their own defense force. The Mormons did so well that Nauvoo became the fastest-growing city in Illinois.
Then some members of the group split apart, because of a new message Smith claimed to have received from God. Smith said God gave permission for Mormons to have more than one wife. This was polygamy. And it was opposed by almost all people.
Some of the Mormons who left the church published a newspaper criticizing Smith and the other Mormon leaders. Followers ordered by Smith destroyed the newspaper’s publishing equipment. This caused non-Mormons to demonstrate and demand that Smith be punished. Smith was arrested and put in jail in Carthage, Illinois. His brother also was arrested. An angry mob attacked the jail and shot both Smith and his brother to death.
The governor of Illinois ordered the Mormons to leave his state. He said only this would prevent further violence. There was no choice. They had to leave.
The Mormons had a new leader: Brigham Young. Young decided to take his people west and find a new home for them. He wanted a place where they would be safe — where no one could interfere with their religion.
Brigham Young told his people that he had seen their new home in a dream. He said they would search for it in the West, for a wide beautiful valley. He said he would recognize it when he saw it.
That will be our story next week.
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ANNOUNCER:
Our program was written by Frank Beardsley. The narrators were Steve Ember and Bob Doughty. Transcripts, MP3s and podcasts of our programs are online, along with historical images, at voaspecialenglish.com. Join us again next week for THE MAKING OF A NATION – an American history series in VOA Special English.
This is program #86 of THE MAKING OF A NATION
American History Series: The Effort to Make Kansas a Slave State
The Supreme Court’s Dred Scott decision in 1857 did not calm the storm that divided the nation. Instead, it increased its fury. Transcript of radio broadcast:
20 May 2009
Welcome to THE MAKING OF A NATION – American history in VOA Special English.
Early in eighteen fifty-seven, the United States Supreme Court announced one of its most important rulings. The high court decided the case of a slave named Dred Scott.
This week in our series, Harry Monroe and Leo Scully tell us about the ruling, and the continuing national debate over slavery.
VOICE ONE:
A painting of Dred Scott
Dred Scott
Dred Scott lived in Missouri, where slavery was legal. Then he was sold to a man who took him to Illinois and Wisconsin, where slavery was not legal. After four years, he was returned to Missouri. Dred Scott demanded his freedom, because of the years he had spent in places where slavery was illegal. Congress had banned slavery in those places under the Missouri Compromise Act of Eighteen Twenty.
The Supreme Court ruled that Congress did not have the power to close territories to slavery. It said the Missouri Compromise was a violation of the United States Constitution, and that Dred Scott was not a free man.
VOICE TWO:
James Buchanan was sworn-in as president at the time of the Dred Scott case. Buchanan believed the Supreme Court’s decision would put an end to the dispute over slavery. He believed that Americans — North and South — would accept the decision as the final word in the dispute.
This did not happen. The Dred Scott decision did not calm the storm that divided the nation. Instead, it increased its fury.
VOICE ONE:
New trouble threatened to break out in the territory of Kansas between pro-slavery and anti-slavery settlers. In the past few years, the two sides had argued and fought over their opinions. They even had formed two separate governments. The pro-slavery forces controlled the legal government. The anti-slavery forces controlled an opposition government which had no power.
Supporters of slavery wanted to organize a constitutional convention that could put Kansas into the Union as a slave state. The pro-slavery legislature passed a bill calling for such a convention.
The bill gave supporters of slavery every chance to control the election of delegates to the convention. And it gave the convention complete freedom to make its own rules. The bill provided no way for the people of Kansas to vote on their own constitution.
VOICE TWO:
The governor of the Kansas territory, John Geary, vetoed the bill. But the legislature quickly overruled his veto. Pro-slavery men called for Geary to get out of Kansas. Some talked of shooting him if he did not leave.
Governor Geary had been living under extreme tension for months. He had worked hard to keep Kansas peaceful. He was angry, because he could get no help from the federal government. He sent his resignation to President Buchanan.
Then the former governor spoke publicly. He said most of the settlers in Kansas were peace-loving people. He said only a small group was responsible for the trouble there. Geary said a few powerful men hoped to make Kansas a slave state. If this failed, Geary said, they hoped their actions would produce civil war.
VOICE ONE:
President Buchanan appointed a new governor for Kansas. Buchanan told him that slavery in the territory must be decided on the votes of the people of the territory. And he said the people must be given a fair chance to approve or reject a constitution for statehood.
The new governor arrived in Kansas at the end of May, eighteen fifty-seven. He explained his policies in a speech to the people of Kansas. The new governor promised to enforce the laws of the pro-slavery legislature — but only those laws which were constitutional. He urged everyone to vote in the coming election of delegates to the constitutional convention.
He said he was hopeful that the convention would offer its constitution to the people for their approval or rejection. He added that Congress would not accept Kansas as a slave state, or a free state, until the people had voted on the question of slavery.
VOICE TWO:
On June fifteenth, the election was held for delegates to the constitutional convention. Most anti-slavery men did not vote, because their names had been kept off the voting lists by pro-slavery officials. Others refused to vote, because they believed the election was unfair.
Sixty delegates were elected. All supported slavery. They planned to meet in the autumn to begin work on a constitution for Kansas.
Most of the delegates were wild, rough men who found it difficult to read and write. But these men were sure of one thing. They wanted Kansas to be a slave state.
VOICE ONE:
A map of the Territory of Kansas
Territory of Kansas
The delegates began the constitution by claiming that the right of property was higher than any constitutional power. They said a slave-owner had as much right to his property as the owner of any other kind of property.
Then they wrote the different parts of the document. One part of the constitution severely limited the right of the legislature to free slaves. Another part barred free negroes from entering Kansas. And another prevented the constitution from being changed for seven years.
VOICE TWO:
Most of the delegates to the Kansas constitutional convention wanted to send the document directly to Congress for approval. They did not want to give the people of Kansas a chance to vote on it. They were sure that the majority of the population would reject a constitution that made slavery legal.
Some delegates, however, knew that Congress would not approve statehood for Kansas unless the people voted on the constitution. The two sides finally agreed on a compromise.
VOICE ONE:
The constitution itself would not be offered to the people. Instead, the people would vote only on the question of slavery. They could vote for the constitution with slavery or the constitution without slavery.
If the voters approved the constitution with slavery, then Kansas would be open to new slaves. If they approved the constitution without slavery, then Kansas would be closed to new slaves. Slaves already in the territory could be kept there.
This compromise brought a cry of anger from opponents of slavery in Kansas. They said the constitutional convention had only given them the right to vote for limited slavery or unlimited slavery. It had not given them the right to vote for freedom.
VOICE TWO:
President Buchanan had promised the people of Kansas that they would have a fair chance to vote on their constitution. But members of his cabinet told him to forget this promise.
They said Americans were tired of the dispute in Kansas and would accept any settlement. They told Buchanan that approval of the constitution would end the Kansas problem. It would satisfy the South, they said, and the North would soon forget about Kansas.
Under this pressure, President Buchanan made his decision. He would ask Congress to accept the pro-slavery Kansas constitution and make the territory a slave state.
VOICE ONE:
In Kansas, the vote on slavery was held. Most opponents of slavery did not vote. They were waiting until they could vote against the complete statehood constitution.
Many of the votes were illegal. Still, Kansas officials declared that slavery had been approved. They urged Congress to make Kansas a state under this condition. Shortly after, President Buchanan sent Congress a similar message.
Buchanan’s chief opponent on the statehood bill was a member of his own Democratic Party, Senator Stephen Douglas of Illinois. Douglas did not oppose slavery. But he believed that the people of a territory had the right to make their own decision to accept or reject slavery.
VOICE TWO:
Stephen Douglas united other Democrats and members of the anti-slavery Republican Party to fight against the bill in the Senate. He lost. The Senate approved the bill to make Kansas a state where slavery was legal.
The House of Representatives, however, rejected the bill. Instead, it approved a bill to let the people of Kansas vote again on their statehood constitution. The Senate approved a compromise version of this House bill.
VOICE ONE:
So the people of Kansas got another chance to show that they did not want a pro-slavery constitution. They voted and rejected the constitution by a large majority.
The pro-slavery statehood constitution was dead. Kansas would continue as a territory for a few more years. But there would be no further attempt to make it a slave state.
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ANNOUNCER:
Our program was written by Frank Beardsley. The narrators were Harry Monroe and Leo Scully. Transcripts, MP3s and podcasts of our programs can be found, along with historical images, at voaspecialenglish.com. And you can follow our series on Twitter at twitter.com/voalearnenglish, spelled as one word. Join us again next week for THE MAKING OF A NATION — an American history series in VOA Special English.
This is program #85 of THE MAKING OF A NATION
American History Series: Slavery Debate Intensifies With Dred Scott Ruling
The high court ruled that Congress had no power to bar slavery in the new territories, canceling the Missouri Compromise of 1820. The case involved a Missouri slave named Dred Scott. Transcript of radio broadcast:
13 May 2009
Welcome to THE MAKING OF A NATION — American history in VOA Special English.
As we said last week, James Buchanan of Pennsylvania won the presidential election of eighteen fifty-six. He defeated John Fremont, the candidate of the newly created Republican Party, which opposed slavery.
Buchanan, a Democrat, had often supported the South in the dispute over slavery. Most of the new president’s closest friends were southerners. He wrote that the North was too aggressive toward the South and should stop interfering in the slave states.
Buchanan said the South had good reason to leave the Union if abolitionists continued their attacks against slavery.
This week on our series, Jack Moyles and Stan Busby tell more about James Buchanan. And they discuss his influence in the Supreme Court ruling in the case of a slave from Missouri named Dred Scott.
VOICE ONE:
As the new president, Buchanan believed he could solve the slave question by keeping the abolitionists quiet. Success would mean the end of the anti-slavery Republican Party.
In choosing his cabinet, Buchanan wanted men who shared the same ideas and interests. President Pierce had tried to unite the different groups in the party by giving each a representative in his cabinet. This had not worked. It had driven the different party groups farther apart.
Buchanan had served in President Polk’s cabinet. He remembered how well its members worked together. He said it was the unity of this cabinet that made Polk’s administration so successful.
VOICE TWO:
Buchanan gave the job of Secretary of State to Lewis Cass of Michigan. Cass was seventy-five years old. His mind had lost its sharpness. This did not worry Buchanan, because he had planned to be his own foreign minister.
The job of treasury secretary went to Howell Cobb, a southern moderate from Georgia. Southerners also were named as secretary of war, interior secretary and postmaster general.
Isaac Toucey of Connecticut was given the job of Navy secretary. Toucey was a northerner. But he supported many policies of the South. Another northerner — Jeremiah Black of Pennsylvania — became attorney general.
In forming his cabinet, Buchanan did not ask for advice from Senator Stephen Douglas of Illinois. Douglas was the party’s leader in the Senate and the most powerful Democrat in the northwest.
Douglas believed that the northwest should have two representatives in the cabinet. He said Cass could be one of them. But Douglas wanted one of his own supporters to be the other. Buchanan refused what Douglas wanted. And he gave the administration’s support to a political enemy of Douglas.
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VOICE ONE:
James Buchanan was sworn-in as president on March fourth, eighteen fifty-seven. In his inaugural speech, the new president denounced the long dispute over slavery. He said he hoped it would end soon.
Buchanan said the dispute could be settled easily by doing two things: by ending interference with slavery in states where it was legal. And by letting the people of a territory decide if they wanted slavery.
Buchanan said he expected the Supreme Court to rule soon on the right of the people of a territory to decide this. He said he was sure that all good citizens — North and South — would accept the high court’s ruling.
VOICE TWO:
A painting of Dred Scott
Dred Scott
At the time he said this, Buchanan already knew what the court’s decision would be. He had even used his influence to help one member of the court to decide. The decision was made in the case of Dred Scott, a negro slave.
Scott was sold in Missouri to an army doctor who took him to Illinois and then went into the Wisconsin territory. Scott lived in these two places for almost four years before he was returned to Missouri.
Scott asked a court in Missouri to give him his freedom. He claimed that living in Illinois and Wisconsin — where slavery was illegal — had made him a free man.
VOICE ONE:
The court agreed with Scott and gave him his freedom. But the decision was appealed, and the Supreme Court of Missouri ruled against him. Scott then took his case to a federal court. Finally, he asked the United States Supreme Court to decide if he was a slave or a free man.
The Supreme Court took up the case in December, eighteen fifty-six. The judges studied it carefully because it raised serious constitutional questions.
Scott claimed he was free because he had lived in free territory. It was free because Congress — in the Missouri Compromise of Eighteen Twenty — made slavery illegal in that area. Scott’s owner raised the questions: Did Congress have the Constitutional power to close a territory to slavery? Was the Missouri Compromise legal?
VOICE TWO:
At first, most of the nine Supreme Court judges had planned to give a decision without answering this question. They did not want to involve the court in this bitter dispute. The majority decided that a negro was not a citizen. Therefore, they said, Dred Scott had no right to ask the court to hear his case.
In this way, the case could be settled without deciding on the power of Congress to act on slavery in the territories.
But two of the nine Supreme Court judges opposed this ruling. Both were from the North. They had said they would write a minority decision. They said their decision would include a statement that Congress did have power over slavery in the territories.
VOICE ONE:
Since two members of the court had planned to offer views on this question, the other seven decided the majority also should do so.
Of the seven, five were from the South. They did not believe Congress had any power over territorial slavery. The remaining two judges — both from the North — did not want to make what they felt would be a political decision.
One southern member of the Supreme Court was James Catron, a good friend of James Buchanan. Buchanan had written to him asking when the court would act on the Dred Scott case.
VOICE TWO:
Catron had answered that the court would rule soon. Then he asked for Buchanan’s help in getting one of the northern members of the court to vote with the five from the South. He told the president that the country would more easily accept the court’s ruling if one of the northern judges gave his support. Catron proposed that Buchanan write to Justice Robert Grier of Pennsylvania.
So Buchanan wrote to Grier. He told him that a strong decision in the Dred Scott case might do much to bring peace to the country. Grier agreed. He said he would vote with the five southerners. They would rule that the Constitution did not give Congress power over slavery in the territories.
All this had happened in the few weeks before Buchanan became president.
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VOICE ONE:
The Supreme Court finally announced its decision just two days after Buchanan moved into the White House. Chief Justice Roger Taney read the decision in the small courtroom in the Capitol building.
The room was crowded with congressmen, senators, government officials, and newspapermen. Chief Justice Taney began reading the decision at eleven o’clock. He read for more than two and a half hours.
He said the high court rejected Scott’s claim of freedom for three reasons. First, Scott was not a citizen. Taney said the Constitution gave the right of citizenship only to members of the white race. Because he was not a citizen, he had no right to ask the court to hear his case.
Secondly, Taney said Scott was ruled by the laws of Missouri, the state in which he lived. Missouri laws did not give freedom to slaves who lived temporarily in free territory. Therefore, said Taney, Scott was still a slave.
VOICE TWO:
Then the chief justice took up the question of the free territory in which Scott had lived. It had become free territory under the Missouri Compromise. This was the law that Congress passed in eighteen twenty. This law kept slavery out of the northern part of the territory which the United States bought from France.
Justice Taney said Congress did not have the constitutional power to pass such a law. He said when new territory was won, it belonged to all citizens. He said Congress had the right to govern such territory until it became a state. But he said Congress did not have power to close new territory to any American citizen. He said the citizen from Georgia had as much right to settle in this territory with his slaves as a citizen of Maine with his horse.
Taney said there was no word in the Constitution that gave Congress greater power over slave property than over any other kind of property. The only such power Congress held was the power to guard and protect the rights of the property owner.
To close territory to slaves, Taney said, violated the constitutional rights of slaveholding citizens. Therefore, the Missouri Compromise was unconstitutional. Congress did not have power to act on slavery in the territories.
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ANNOUNCER:
Our program was written by Frank Beardsley. The narrators were Jack Moyles and Stan Busby. Transcripts, MP3s and podcasts of our programs can be found, along with historical images, at voaspecialenglish.com. And you can follow our series on Twitter at twitter.com/voalearnenglish, spelled as one word. Join us again next week for THE MAKING OF A NATION — an American history series in VOA Special English.
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