United States History Student Edition

took place, only about 1,500 voters lived in Kansas, but more than 6,000 people voted. Opponents of slavery refused to accept Kansas’s new laws supporting slavery. They armed themselves, held their own elections, and adopted a constitution banning slavery. By January 1856, Kansas had two rival governments. In May 1856, hundreds of slavery supporters attacked the town of Lawrence, an antislavery stronghold. That same night came reports that a proslavery member of Congress had brutally beaten antislavery senator Charles Sumner. John Brown, a devout abolitionist, decided retaliation was needed and led a group that murdered five supporters of slavery. Newspapers wrote about “Bleeding Kansas” and “the Civil War in Kansas.” A civil war is a war between citizens of the same country. In October 1856, federal troops arrived to stop the bloodshed. 7 CHECK FOR UNDERSTANDING 1. Explaining What conflict led to the Compromise of 1850, and how was it resolved? 2. Identifying Cause and Effect What events led to the violence of “Bleeding Kansas”? The Republican Party Is Formed GUIDING QUESTION How did a new political party affect the challenges to slavery? After passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act, both the Democratic Party and the Whig Party lost supporters. Antislavery Whigs and Democrats joined with Free-Soilers to form the Republican Party. One of the party’s major goals was the banning of slavery in new territories. In the 1854 elections, the Republicans showed strength in the North, winning control of the House of Representatives and several state governments. Meanwhile, the Democrats were becoming a party of the South. Almost three-fourths of the Democratic candidates from free states lost in 1854. The sectional division became more apparent in the presidential election of 1856.

It is believed that more than 50 people were killed in the violence between proslavery and antislavery forces in Kansas in the 1850s.

freedom for enslaved people. Free African Americans and whites intensified their work on the Underground Railroad, helping enslaved people find their way to freedom. Democrat Franklin Pierce became president in 1853. He intended to enforce the Fugitive Slave Act. The Kansas-Nebraska Act In 1854, Stephen A. Douglas introduced a bill to organize two territories in the region west of Missouri and Iowa. Both Kansas and Nebraska were north of 36°30’ N latitude, the line set by the Missouri Compromise to limit slavery. If these territories entered the Union as free states, it would end the balance in the Senate. Douglas’s bill would repeal the Missouri Compromise. He proposed a popular vote in each territory on whether to allow slavery. He called his proposal “popular sovereignty.” The term sovereignty refers to rule or control. Popular sovereignty means that the people are the source of all government power. This idea is central to the American system of government. Douglas’s popular sovereignty came to mean a particular method for deciding the question of slavery in a place. The Kansas-Nebraska Act passed in 1854. People rushed to Kansas to vote on slavery. Armed supporters of slavery known as border ruffians (BOHR•duhr RUH•fee•uhns) crossed the border from Missouri just to vote. When elections sovereignty rule or control border ruffians armed supporters of slavery who crossed the border to vote in Kansas

civil war a war between citizens of the same country

North Wind Picture Archives/Alamy Stock Photo

Division and Civil War 423