so the tune of john brown's body which you just listened to uh became very popular many of you may recognize it today as the battle hymn of the republic although the lyrics have clearly been changed in the election of 1860 lincoln was the republican nominee you have him there in blue lincoln supported free soil ideology his goal is to keep slavery from expanding into new territories in his 1860 cooper union address he had said the founders had welcomed congressional power to limit the spread of slavery in the federal territories pointing once again to the northwest ordinance lincoln shattered the credibility of tawny's pro-slavery original intent argument in which the federal government lacked any power to restrict the spread of slavery so lincoln is arguing to keep slavery out of those territories keep it from spreading but says nothing about where it already exists he believes it is constitutionally protected there he's not gonna touch it stephen douglas ran as a democrat but the cell thought he was unreliable and too moderate so as a result the democrats broke into sectional factions over slavery northern democrats nominated douglas who you see there in green he argued that the federal government couldn't regulate or ban slavery in the territories but he supported popular sovereignty and basically his argument is that if a territory votes to be a free territory while they can't keep slave owners from moving in they can not pass laws that would protect slavery and that would dissuade most slave owners even though the whole kansas example kind of says no it wouldn't breckenridge of kentucky is who the southern democrats nominated and he's the sitting vice president you see him there in red he promised to fight for slavery and for a federal slave code to protect slavery in all federal territories so if breckenridge wins every single territory in the united states would be a slave territory and when they got enough people to be a state they would be a slave state and eventually slave owners would basically run the country a third party emerged called the constitutional union party their candidate was john bell who you see there in yellow who took no position on slavery his party argued that the only thing that mattered was the constitution and the union you know things are getting bad when there's an entire political party dedicated to can't we all just get along let's not have a big civil war right now so there's really two different presidential election contests inside the 1860 election so there's two races one in the north is between douglas and lincoln so green versus blue if you're going by the graphic here in the south it's breckenridge versus bell lincoln's not even on the ballot in the deep south right they're not voting for someone who's going to restrict slavery into the territories and here's the results breckenridge swept the south bell won the border states lincoln won the north and the west and of course the territories don't get to vote in presidential elections just like today territories don't get a vote there but oregon and california had already come in as states and so anything you see here in red is a state that voted for lincoln douglas poor douglas only won his home state of missouri lincoln got 40 of the total popular vote but he won the biggest most populous states every free state's electoral votes went to lincoln except new jersey who split theirs lincoln earned the majority of the electoral votes 59 so he would have won even if he only faced a single opponent in the electoral college that's an enormous amount of public support in such a divided nation and it was seen as a mandate for his policies which scared the living hell out of southerners douglas was second in the popular vote with twenty nine point five percent bailed the protest candidate one twelve point six percent breckenridge won eighteen percent of the popular vote but 24 of the electoral college vote and that's because the electoral college favored those slave holding states because of the three-fist compromise so one region basically the north with a little help from the west had just elected a president with no support from the other regions lincoln's not even on the ballot in the deep south and he wins the election lincoln's election on november 6 1860 triggered secession southerners would not accept a president from an anti-slavery party so they refused to accept the election results in 1861 south carolina led six other southern states out of the union south carolina mississippi and florida were the first to secede in december 1860 and january 1861. and remember lincoln isn't going to take office until march right the president doesn't take office until march at this point in time so they're out before lincoln ever takes office and unfortunately the sitting president who's now a lame duck doesn't do anything to stop them or secure american resources in those territories now each of these states issued orders of secession stating that slavery and their fear of a future with racial equality was their justification for leaving and we'll go over all of the seven original declarations of causes or orders of secession that the original seven states passed in our next lecture so there you have it what events and cultural institutions show how divided the nation had become in the 1850s what was in each political party's platform in 1856 and what did they stand for and which parties or candidates competed in the 1860 election on what platforms if you've got that hit the next button at the bottom of the page and go take the bleeding kansas and bleeding sumner recap quiz