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Kansas-Nebraska Act
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The debate over the Kansas-Nebraska Act and the subsequent birth of the Republican Party can be traced back to the enactment of the Missouri Compromise of 1820. The Missouri Compromise concerned the territory acquired from the Louisiana Purchase, which both expanded America's land holdings, while ... posing a threat to the delicate balance achieved in Congress. The dilemma began with the application of Missouri as a slave-state. If admitted, Missouri would upset the even proportion of slave states and free states within the U.S. Senate. Thus the Missouri Compromise was created which called for the admittance of Missouri as a slave state and Maine as a free state. The balance was maintained, yet the vast territories were suddenly a problem.
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Prior to the Kansas-Nebraska Act, the slavery issue had been addressed—although not completely resolved—through several compromises. In 1820, the balance between free and slave states was upheld when Maine was admitted as a free state and Missouri as a slave state. The so-called Missouri Compromise ... mandated that slavery would not be permitted in new territories above the 36° 30' parallel of latitude. Under the Compromise of 1850, California was admitted as a free state, while both slaveholding and nonslaveholding settlers could settle in Utah and New Mexico territories west of Texas (which had been admitted as a slave state in 1845). The Kansas-Nebraska Act essentially overturned the Missouri Compromise, since both territories were above the 36° 30' parallel.
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In addition to these basic political changes, the Kansas-Nebraska Act had direct ramifications. Kansas and Nebraska were promptly opened for settlement in 1854. Although Nebraska remained relatively quiet, Kansas, the destination of most of the new settlers, became a political hotbed. Settlers came to Kansas not only to develop the frontier but ...—and perhaps more importantly—to lend their weight in the determination of whether Kansas would be free or slave.
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The Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854 created the territories of Kansas and Nebraska and opened new lands for settlement, and allowed the settlers to decide whether or not to have slavery. The new Republican Party, formed in reaction against allowing slavery where it had been forbidden, emerged as the dominant force throughout the North. The act was designed by Democratic Senator Stephen A. Douglas of Illinois. While not repealing the Missouri Compromise of 1850, the new law did deem it "inoperative and void". The act established that settlers could decide for themselves whether to allow slavery, in the name of "popular sovereignty" or rule of the people. Opponents denounced the law as a concession to the Slave Power --that is the political machine of slaveowners that controlled the South and much of the national government. The act and the subsequent civil war in Bleeding Kansas was a major step on the way to the American Civil War.
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The Kansas-Nebraska Act resulted in the emigration of many Americans to the region in order to affect the vote concerning the legality of slavery in Kansas. The pro-slavery and anti-slavery groups violently clashed between the time the act was passed and 1858. Called "border ruffians" by their Northern counterparts, southern pro-slavery factions, largely from Missouri, fought heavily with northern abolitionists, particularly those associated with the New England Emigrant Aid Company. The following documents describe the bloody events which led to the coining of the phrase "Bleeding Kansas" to describe the civil war erupting in the new territory. Of major concern was the electing of the territorial legislation in the Kansas territory. Convinced the elections were fraudulent and illegal, Charles Robinson, governor and free-Soiler, wrote a letter to Eli Thayer of the New England Emigrant Aid Company describing the voting irregularities, which is provided below.
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The Kansas-Nebraska Act was passed by Congress in 1854. Like the Compromise of 1850, it dealt with the problem of slavery in newly formed territories. The act created the territories of Kansas and Nebraska and gave the people of these territories the right to regulate matters related to slavery. It ... provided that before the territories became states, the people of each territory could decide whether to allow slavery in the new states. The decision process was called popular sovereignty. Many Northerners opposed the act.
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Kansas-Nebraska Act