Answer:
Lincoln’s issues could be traced back to 1619 when the first slave ship arrived in Virginia. Since that time, slavery had ended in half of the United States, and the question remained whether the nation could continue being half-slave and half-free.
For decades, Americans tried to avoid this question, and many hoped slavery would simply die out on its own. Instead, slavery began to expand into new territories, and the queshasould no longer be ignored.
Between 1820 and 1860, Americans tried to fashion several compromises on slavery, but these compromises created new problems and new divisions. Slavery was not simply a political issue to be worked out through compromise. Rather it was a profoundly moral issue, which is something Lincoln understood. As he wrote in a letter to a friend, “If slavery is not wrong, nothing is wrong.”
In this lesson, you will learn how Americans tried to keep the United States united despite their deep divisions over slavery. Some events during this period held the nation together, whereas others pulled it apart. You will also find out how Americans finally answered the question of whether a nation founded on the idea of freedom could endure half-slave and half-free.
Explanation:
I did not know which part to annotate so I annotated the entire text above. Hope it helps :)
