Scholar James Lewis briefly examines the repeated "war scares"—fears of possible outbreaks of violence between settlers and Native Americans—that troubled Illinois up until the outbreak of the Black Hawk War in 1832.

To view this clip, select "Native Americans and War Scares on the Frontier" under "Native American Relations Video."

Scholar James Lewis contrasts antebellum Midwestern settlers' concepts of orderly land division and ownership with Native American borderless and communal concepts of land use.

To view this clip, select "Settlement of the Northwest Territory" under "Native American Relations Video."

John Mack Faragher of Yale University discusses the range of relationships between Native Americans (particularly the Kickapoo) and settlers in antebellum Illinois. He looks at the development from relatively benign relations, involving the trading of goods and ideas, to the rise of racism and violence following the War of 1812 and the Black Hawk War.

To view this clip, select "Settlers and Native Americans Before the Black Hawk War" under "Native American Relations Video."

Michael F. Holt of the University of Virginia outlines Stephen Douglas's creation of the Kansas-Nebraska Act and the repercussions of Congress's passing the Act.

To view this clip, select "Stephen Douglas and the Kansas-Nebraska Act" under "Frontier Settlement Video."

Michael F. Holt of the University of Virginia discusses the struggle to resolve disputes over territory acquired during the Mexican-American War, particularly the dispute over how (and whether) slavery should spread into the new territories.

To view this clip, select "Origins of the Compromise of 1850" under "Frontier Settlement Video."

Michael Johnson of Johns Hopkins University discusses the reasons antebellum Midwestern settlers, including those in Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois, excluded slavery from their states. Johnson considers racism and fear of competition as two possible reasons.

To view this clip, select "The Expansion of Slavery, White Racial Attitudes, and the Settlement of Illinois" under "Frontier Settlement Video."

John Mack Faragher of Yale University outlines the patterns of antebellum settlement in Illinois, looking also at ideas of family and an American desire for mobility as forces behind settlement.

Too view this clip, select "The Settlement of Illinois" under "Frontier Settlement Video."

Edward L. Ayers of the University of Virginia looks at the early antebellum support of African colonization as an answer to U.S. racial tensions, and considers it as a possible root of the later abolitionist movement.

To listen to this lecture, select "The Movement of African-American Colonization" under "African-American Experience Video."

Edward L. Ayers of the University of Virginia discusses the movement of religions, ways of life, racial attitudes, and other cultural aspects into frontier areas. Ayers focuses specifically on the movement of race-related concepts into Illinois, including a general resistance to slaveholding and a general unfriendliness to free blacks. He also mentions how politicians, such as Abraham Lincoln, had to take care to tailor their political messages for particular regions.

To listen to this lecture, select "Southerners on the Frontier," and scroll to "African-American Experience Videos."

Charles McCurdy of the University of Virginia follows the progression of the U.S. Supreme Court case Dred Scott v. Sandford up the U.S. court system, detailing the legal precedents and state laws that determined each decision and each step along the way. This lecture continues from the lecture "The Dred Scott Case, Part One: Background."

To listen to this lecture, select "The Dred Scott Case, Part Two: Taney's Decision" under "African-American Experience Video."