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AP U.S. History Diagnostic 10 210 Views


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Description:

AP U.S. History Diagnostic 10. What led to the splintering of the political parties shown in the image?

Language:
English Language

Transcript

00:00

[ musical flourish ]

00:03

And here's your Shmoop du jour, brought to you by political splintering,

00:07

an occupational hazard when trying to remodel a country's foundation.

00:11

All right. What led to the splintering of

00:13

political parties shown in the image?

00:15

This one, right here. What happened?

00:17

And here are your potential answers. [ ding ]

00:20

[ mumbling ]

00:23

All right, well, let's think about it.

00:25

Well, four major candidates in the running for

00:27

a presidential election isn't something we see

00:30

too often, at least these days.

00:31

And it was pretty unusual for 1860, as well.

00:34

Just prior to the election, the two-party system stood strong,

00:38

but something must've driven the wedge that pulled them apart.

00:42

All right, did the splintering of political parties arise out of

00:45

B - debates over additional amendments

00:48

to the Constitution? Hmm.

00:50

Well, there certainly were concerns over amending

00:52

the Constitution, but this answer feels a little bit vague.

00:55

Let's see if we can find something that hits a little bit harder.

00:58

Could the political divide have resulted from C -

01:01

disagreements over granting women the right to vote?

01:05

Well, while both the women's suffrage movement and the

01:07

growth of western territories were on citizens' minds,

01:10

there was something much louder hammering away

01:13

at our nation's conscience. Yeah.

01:15

That eliminates C and D.

01:17

Which means that the splintering of political parties occurred

01:20

because of A - sectional concerns

01:22

over slavery and the rise of nativism.

01:26

By 1860, people were

01:27

quite literally at each other's throats over the issue

01:30

of slavery. With vocal disagreements over abolition,

01:33

as well as an increase in anti-immigrant sentiment,

01:37

the Democrats split into two pieces

01:40

and a new Constitutional Union Party,

01:43

or CUP, like that, appeared,

01:45

resulting in a four-way election.

01:47

So A hits the nail on the head.

01:49

With Lincoln's election, the country also split in two,

01:52

resulting in the bloodiest war in our nation's history.

01:56

Maybe they shouldn't have let those wounds fester. [ ding ding ]

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