This document provides an overview of several chapters covering the period from 1793-1861 focusing on the growing sectional tensions between the North and South over the issue of slavery. It discusses the rise of the cotton economy in the South and slavery's role in it. As the North industrialized and grew abolitionist, the South sought to protect and expand the institution of slavery leading to various political battles and compromises until the election of Lincoln ultimately led to Southern secession and the Civil War.