A School History of the United States

by John Bach McMaster

CHAPTER XXV

THE TERRITORIES BECOME SLAVE SOIL

%384. Franklin Pierce, Fourteenth President.%—Although the struggle with slavery was thus growing more and more serious, the two great parties pretended to consider the question as finally settled. In 1852 the Democrats nominated Franklin Pierce and William E. King, and declared in their platform that they would "abide by and adhere to" the Compromise of 1850, and would "resist all attempts at renewing, in Congress or out of it, the agitation of the slavery question." The Whigs nominated General Winfield Scott, and declared that they approved the fugitive-slave law, and accepted the compromise measures of 1850 as "a settlement in principle" of the slavery question, and would do all they could to prevent any further discussion of it.

[Illustration: Franklin Pierce]

So far as the Whigs were concerned, the question was settled; for the Northern people, angry at their acceptance of the Compromise of 1850 and the fugitive-slave law, refused to vote for Scott, and Pierce was elected.[1]

[Footnote 1: Pierce carried every state except Massachusetts, Vermont,
Tennessee, and Kentucky.]

The Free-soilers had nominated John P. Hale and George W. Julian.

%385. The Nebraska Bill.%—Pierce was inaugurated March 4, 1853. He, too, believed that all questions relating to slavery were settled. But he had not been many months in office when the old quarrel was raging as bitterly as ever. In 1853 all that part of our country which lies between the Missouri River and the Rocky Mountains, the south boundary of Kansas and 49°, was wilderness, known as the Platte country, and was without any kind of territorial government. In January, 1854, a bill to organize this great piece of country and call it the territory of Nebraska was reported to the Senate by the Committee on Territories, of which Stephen A. Douglas of Illinois was chairman. Every foot of it was north of 36° 30', and according to the Missouri Compromise was free soil. But the bill provided for popular sovereignty; that is, for the right of the people of Nebraska, when they made a state, to have it free or slave, as they pleased.

%386. The Kansas-Nebraska Law.%—An attempt was at once made to prevent this. But Douglas recalled his bill and brought in another, providing for two territories, one to be called Kansas[1] and the other Nebraska, expressly repealing the Missouri Compromise,[2] and opening the country north of 36° 30' to slavery.[3] The Free-soilers, led on by Salmon P. Chase of Ohio, Seward of New York, and Charles Sumner of Massachusetts, did all they could to defeat the bill; but it passed, and Pierce signed it and made it law.[4]

[Footnote 1: The northern and southern boundaries of Kansas were those of the present state, but it extended westward to the Rocky Mountains.]

[Footnote 2: It declared that the slavery restriction of the Missouri Compromise "was suspended by the principles of the legislation of 1850, commonly called the compromise measures, and is hereby declared inoperative.">[

[Footnote 3: The "true intent and meaning" of this act, said the law, is, "not to legislate slavery into any territory or state, nor to exclude it therefrom, but to leave the people thereof perfectly free to form and regulate their domestic institutions in their own way, subject only to the Constitution of the United States." Read Rhodes's History of the United States, Vol. I., pp. 425-490.]

[Footnote 4: May 30, 1854.]

%387. The Struggle for Kansas.%—Thus was it ordained that Kansas and Nebraska, once expressly set apart as free soil, should become free or slave states according as they were settled while territories by antislavery or proslavery men. And now began a seven years' struggle for Kansas. "Come on, then," said Seward of New York in a speech against the Kansas Bill; "Come on, then, gentlemen of the slave states. Since there is no escaping your challenge, I accept it on behalf of freedom. We will engage in competition for the virgin soil of Kansas, and God give the victory to the side that is stronger in numbers as it is in the right."

[Illustration: %THE UNITED STATES in 1851 SEVENTY FIVE YEARS AFTER
INDEPENDENCE Showing Railroads and Overland Routes]

This described the situation exactly. The free-state men of the North and the slave-state men of the South were to rush into Kansas and struggle for its possession. The moment the law opening Kansas for settlement was known in Missouri, numbers of men crossed the Missouri River, entered the territory, held squatters' meetings,[1] drove a few stakes into the ground to represent "squatter claims," went home, and called on the people of the South to hurry into Kansas. Many did so, and began to erect tents and huts on the Missouri River at a place which they called Atchison.[2]

[Footnote 1: At one of their meetings it was resolved: "That we will afford protection to no abolitionist as a settler of this country." "That we recognize the institution of slavery as already existing in this territory, and advise stockholders to introduce their property as early as possible.">[

[Footnote 2: Called after Senator Atchison of Missouri.]

But the men of the North had not been idle, and in July a band of free-state men, sent on by the New England Emigrant Aid Society,[1] entered Kansas and founded a town on the Kansas River some miles to the south and west of Atchison. Other emigrants came in a few weeks later, and their collection of tents received the name of Lawrence.[2]

[Footnote 1: The New England Emigrant Aid Society was founded in 1854 by
Hon. Eli Thayer of Worcester, Mass., in order "to plant a free state in
Kansas," by aiding antislavery men to go out there and settle.]

[Footnote 2: After Amos A. Lawrence, secretary of the Aid Society. It was a city of tents. Not a building existed. Later came the log cabin, which was a poor affair, as timber was scarce. The sod hut now so common in the Northwest was not thought of. In the early days the "hay tent" was the usual house, and was made by setting up two rows of poles, then bringing their tops together, thatching the roof and sides with hay. The two gable ends (in which were the windows and doors) were of sod.]

What was thus taking place at Lawrence happened elsewhere, so that by October, 1854, that part of Kansas along the Missouri River was held by the slave-state men, and the part south of the Kansas River by the free-state men.[1]

[Footnote 1: The proslavery towns were Atchison, Leavenworth, Lecompton,
Kickapoo. The antislavery towns were Lawrence, Topeka, Manhattan,
Waubunsee, Hampden, Ossawatomie.]

In November of the same year the struggle began. There was to be an election of a territorial delegate[1] to represent Kansas in Congress, and a day or two before the time set for it the Missourians came over the border in armed bands, took possession of the polls, voted illegally, and elected a proslavery delegate.

[Footnote 1: Each territory is allowed to send a delegate to the House of Representatives, where he can speak, but not vote.]

%388. Kansas a Slave Territory.%—The election of members of the territorial legislature took place in March, 1855, and for this the Missourians made great preparations. On the principle of popular sovereignty the people of Kansas were to decide whether the territory should be slave or free. Should the majority of the legislature consist of free-state men, then Kansas would be a free territory. Should a majority of proslavery men be chosen, then Kansas was doomed to have slavery fastened on her, and this the Missourians determined should be done. For weeks before the election, therefore, the border counties of Missouri were all astir. Meetings were held, and secret societies, called Blue Lodges, were formed, the members of which were pledged to enter Kansas on the day of election, take possession of the polls, and elect a proslavery legislature. The plan was strictly carried out, and as election day drew near, the Missourians, fully armed, entered Kansas in companies, squads, and parties, like an invading army, voted, and then went home to Missouri. Every member of the legislature save one was a proslavery man, and when that body met, all the slave laws of Missouri were adopted and slavery was formally established in Kansas.

%389. The Topeka Free-State Constitution.%—The free-state men repudiated the bogus legislature, held a convention at Topeka, made a free-state constitution, and submitted it to the popular vote. The people having ratified it (of course no proslavery men voted), a governor and legislature were chosen. When the legislature met, senators were elected and Congress was asked to admit Kansas into the Union as a state.

%390. Personal Liberty Laws; the Underground Railroad.%—The feeling of the people of the free states toward slavery can be seen from many signs. The example set by Vermont in 1850 was followed in 1854 by Rhode Island, Connecticut, and Michigan, and in 1855 by Maine and Massachusetts, in each of which were passed "Personal Liberty laws," designed to prevent free negroes from being carried into slavery on the claim that they were fugitive slaves. Certain state officers were required to act as counsel for any one arrested as a fugitive, and to see that he had a fair trial by jury. To seize a free negro with intent to reduce him to slavery was made a crime.

Another sign of the times was the sympathy manifested for the operations of what was called the Underground Railroad. It was, of course, not a railroad at all, but an organization by which slaves escaping from their masters were aided in getting across the free states to Canada.

%391. Breaking up of Old Parties.%—Thus matters stood when, in 1856, the time came to elect a President, and found the old parties badly disorganized. The political events of four years had produced great changes. The death of Clay[1] and Webster[2] deprived the Whigs of their oldest and greatest leaders. The earnest support that party gave to the Compromise of 1850 and the execution of the fugitive-slave law estranged thousands of voters in the free states. The Kansas-Nebraska Bill, opposed as it was by every Northern Whig, completed the ruin and left the party a wreck.

[Footnote 1: June 29, 1852.]

[Footnote 2: October 24, 1852.]

But the Democrats had also suffered because of the Kansas-Nebraska law and the repeal of the Compromise of 1820. No anti-extension-of-slavery Democrat could longer support the old party. Thousands had therefore broken away, and, acting with the dissatisfied Whigs, formed an unorganized opposition known as "Anti-Nebraska men."

%392. The Movement against Immigrants.%—Many old Whigs, however, could not bring themselves to vote with Democrats. These joined the American or Know-nothing party. From the close of the Revolution there had never been a year when a greater or less number of foreigners did not come to our shores. After 1820 the numbers who came each twelvemonth grew larger and larger, till they reached 30,000 in 1830, and 60,000 in 1836, while in the decade 1830-1840 more than 500,000 immigrants landed at New York city alone.

As the newcomers hurried westward into the cities of the Mississippi valley, the native population was startled by the appearance of men who often could not speak our language. In Cincinnati in 1840 one half the voters were of foreign birth. The cry was now raised that our institutions, our liberties, our system of government, were at the mercy of men from the monarchical countries of Europe. A demand was made for a change in the naturalization law, so that no foreigner could become a citizen till he had lived here twenty-one years.

%393. The American Republicans or Native Americans.%—Neither the Whigs nor the Democrats would endorse this demand, so the people of Louisiana in 1841 called a state convention and founded the American Republican, or, as it was soon called, the Native American party. Its principles were

1. Put none but native Americans in office.

2. Require a residence of twenty-one years in this country before naturalization.

3. Keep the Bible in the schools.

4. Protect from abuse the proceedings necessary to get naturalization papers.

As the members would not tell what the secrets of this party were, and very often would not say whom they were going to vote for, and when questioned would answer "I don't know," it got the name of "Know-nothing" party.[1]

[Footnote 1: Rhodes's History of the United States, Vol. II., pp. 51-58; McMaster's With the Fathers, pp. 87-106.]

For a time the party flourished greatly and secured six members of the House of Representatives, then it declined in power; but the immense increase in immigration between 1846 and 1850 again revived it, and. somewhere in New York city in 1852 a secret, oath-bound organization, with signs, grips, and passwords, was founded, and spread with such rapidity that in 1854 it carried the elections in Massachusetts, New York, and Delaware. Next year (1855) it elected the governors and legislatures of eight states, and nearly carried six more. Encouraged by these successes, the leaders determined to enter the campaign of 1856, and called a party convention which nominated Millard Fillmore and Andrew Jackson Donelson. Delegates from seven states left the convention because it would not stand by the Missouri Compromise, and taking the name North Americans nominated N. P. Banks. He would not accept, and the bolters then joined the Republicans.

%394. Beginning of the Republican Party.%—As early as 1854, when the Kansas-Nebraska Bill was before Congress, the question was widely discussed all over the North and West, whether the time had not come to form a new party out of the wreck of the old. With this in view a meeting of citizens of all parties was held at Ripon, Wisconsin, at which the formation of a new party on the slavery issue was recommended, and the name Republican suggested. This was before the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Bill.

After its passage a thousand citizens of Michigan signed a call for a state mass meeting at Jackson, where a state party was formed, named Republican, and a state ticket nominated, on which were Free-soilers, Whigs, and Anti-Nebraska Democrats. Similar "fusion tickets" were adopted in Wisconsin and Vermont, where the name Republican was used, and in Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, New Hampshire, and Connecticut.

The success of the new party in Wisconsin and Michigan in 1854, and its yet greater success in 1855, led the chairmen of the Republican state committees of Ohio, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, Vermont, and Wisconsin to issue a call for an informal convention at Pittsburg on February 22, 1856. At this meeting the National Republican party was formed, and from it went a call for a national nominating convention to meet (June 17, 1856) at Philadelphia, where John C. Frémont and William L. Dayton were nominated.

The Free-soilers had joined the Republicans and so disappeared from politics as a party.

The Whigs, or "Silver Grays," met and endorsed Fillmore.

The Democrats nominated James Buchanan and John C. Breckinridge and carried the election. The Whigs and the Know-nothings then disappeared from national politics.

[Illustration: James Buchanan]

%395. James Buchanan, Fifteenth President; the "Bred Scott Decision."%—When Buchanan and Breckinridge were inaugurated, March 4, 1857, certain matters regarding slavery were considered as legally settled forever, as follows:

1. Foreign slave trade forbidden.

2. Slave trade between the states allowed.

3. Fugitive slaves to be returned.

4. Whether a state should permit or abolish slavery to be determined by the state.

5. Squatter sovereignty to be allowed in Kansas and Nebraska, Utah and New Mexico territories.

6. The people in a territory to determine whether they would have a slave or a free state when they made a state constitution.

Now there were certain questions regarding slavery which were not settled, and one of them was this: If a slave is taken by his master to a free state and lives there for a while, does he become free?

To this the Supreme Court gave the answer two days after Buchanan was inaugurated. A slave by the name of Dred Scott had been taken by his master from the slave state of Missouri to the free state of Illinois, and then to the free soil of Minnesota, and then back to the state of Missouri, where Scott sued for his freedom, on the ground that his residence on free soil had made him a free man. Two questions of vast importance were thus raised:

1. Could a negro whose ancestors had been sold as slaves become a citizen of one of the states in the Union? For unless Dred Scott was a citizen of Missouri, where he then lived, he could not sue in the United States court.

2. Did Congress have power to enact the Missouri Compromise? For if it did not then the restriction of slavery north of 36°30' was illegal, and Dred Scott's residence in Minnesota did not make him free.

From the lower courts the case came on appeal to the Supreme Court, which decided

1. That Dred Scott was not a citizen, and therefore could not sue in the United States courts. His residence in Minnesota had not made him free.

2. That Congress could not shut slave property out of the territories any more than it could shut out a horse or a cow.

3. That the piece of legislation known as the Missouri Compromise of 1820 was null and void. This confirmed all that had been gained for slavery by the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854, and opened to slavery Oregon and Washington, which were free territories.

%396. Effect of the Dred Scott Decision.%—Hundreds of thousands of copies of this famous decision were printed at once and scattered broadcast over the country as campaign documents. The effect was to fill the Southern people with delight and make them more reckless than ever, to split the Democratic party in the North; to increase the number of Republicans in the North, and make them more determined than ever to stop the spread of slavery into the territories.

[Illustration: %EXPANSION OF SLAVE SOIL IN THE UNITED STATES 1790-1860%]

%397. Struggle for Freedom in Kansas.%—We left Kansas in 1856 with a proslavery governor and legislature in actual possession, and a free-state governor, legislature, and senators seeking recognition at Washington. In 1857 there were so many free-state men in Kansas that they elected an antislavery legislature. But just before the proslavery men went out of power they made a proslavery constitution,[1] and instead of submitting to the people the question, Will you, or will you not, have this constitution? they submitted the question, Will you have this constitution with or without slavery? On this the free settlers would not vote, and so it was adopted with slavery. But when the antislavery legislature met soon after, they ordered the question, Will you, or will you not, have this constitution? to be submitted to the people. Then the free settlers voted, and it was rejected by a great majority. Buchanan, however, paid no attention to the action of the free settlers, but sent the Lecompton constitution to Congress and urged it to admit Kansas as a slave state. But Senator Douglas of Illinois came forward and opposed this, because to force a slave constitution on the people of Kansas, after they had voted against it, was contrary to the doctrine of "popular sovereignty." He, with the aid of other Northern Democrats, defeated the attempt, and Kansas remained a territory till 1861.

[Footnote 1: The convention met at the town of Lecompton; in consequence of which the constitution is known as the "Lecompton constitution.">[

%398. The Lincoln-Douglas Debates.%—The term of Douglas as senator from Illinois was to expire on March 4, 1859. The legislature whose duty it would be to elect his successor was itself to be elected in 1858. The Democrats, therefore, announced that if they secured a majority of the legislators, they would reelect Douglas. The Republicans declared that if they secured a majority, they would elect Abraham Lincoln United States senator. The real question of the campaign thus became, Will the people of Illinois have Stephen A. Douglas or Abraham Lincoln for senator?[1]

[Footnote 1: The Republican state convention at Springfield, June 16, 1858, "resolved, that Abraham Lincoln is the first and only choice of the Republicans of Illinois for the United States Senate as the successor of Stephen A. Douglas.">[

The speech making opened in June, 1858, when Lincoln addressed the convention that nominated him at Springfield. A month later Douglas replied in a speech at Chicago. Lincoln, who was present, answered Douglas the next evening. A few days later, Douglas, who had taken the stump, replied to Lincoln at Bloomington, and the next day was again answered by Lincoln at Springfield. The deep interest aroused by this running debate led the Republican managers to insist that Lincoln should challenge Douglas to a series of joint debates in public. The challenge was sent and accepted, and debates were arranged for at seven towns[1] named by Douglas. The questions discussed were popular sovereignty, the Dred Scott decision, the extension of slavery to the territories; and the discussion of them attracted the attention of the whole country. Lincoln was defeated in the senatorial election; but his great speeches won for him a national reputation.[2]

[Footnote 1: One in each Congressional district except those containing Chicago and Springfield, where both Lincoln and Douglas had already spoken. For a short account of their debates see the Century Magazine for July, 1887, p. 386.]

[Footnote 2: Rhodes's History of the United States, Vol. II., pp. 308-339. Nicolay and Hay's Life of Lincoln, Vol. II., Chaps. 10-16. John T. Morse's Life of Lincoln, Vol. I., Chap. 6.]

%399. John Brown's Raid into Virginia%.—As slavery had become the great political issue of the day, it is not surprising that it excited a lifelong and bitter enemy of slavery to do a foolish act. John Brown was a man of intense convictions and a deep-seated hatred of slavery. When the border ruffianism broke out in Kansas in 1855, he went there with arms and money, and soon became so prominent that he was outlawed and a price set on his head. In 1858 he left Kansas, and in July, 1859, settled near Harpers Ferry, Va. (p. 360). His purpose was to stir up a slave insurrection in Virginia, and so secure the liberation of the negroes. With this in view, one Sunday night in October, 1859, he with less than twenty followers seized the United States armory at Harpers Perry and freed as many slaves and arrested as many whites as possible. But no insurrection or uprising of slaves followed, and before he could escape to the mountains he was surrounded and captured by Robert E. Lee, then a colonel in the army of the United States. Brown was tried on the charges of murder and of treason against the state of Virginia, was found guilty, and in December, 1859, was hanged.

[Illustration: Harpers Ferry]

%400. Split in the Democratic Party.%—Thus it was that one event after another prolonged the struggle with slavery till 1860, when the people were once more to elect a President.

The Democratic nominating convention assembled at Charleston, S.C., in April, and at once went to pieces. A strong majority made up of Northern delegates insisted that the party should declare—"That all questions in regard to the rights of property in states or territories arising under the Constitution of the United States are judicial in their character, and the Democratic party is pledged to abide by and faithfully carry out such determination of these questions as has been or may be made by the Supreme Court of the United States."

This meant to carry out the doctrine laid down in the Dred Scott decision, and was in conflict with the "popular sovereignty" doctrine of Douglas, which was that right of the people to make a slave territory or a free territory is perfect and complete. The minority, composed of the extreme Southern men, rejected the former plan and insisted

1. "That the Democracy of the United States hold these cardinal principles on the subject of slavery in the territories: First, that Congress has no power to abolish slavery in the territories. Second, that the territorial legislature has no power to abolish slavery in any territory, nor to prohibit the introduction of slaves therein, nor any power to exclude slavery therefrom, nor any right to destroy or impair the right of property in slaves by any legislation whatever."

2. That the Federal government must protect slavery "on the high seas, in the territories, and wherever else its constitutional authority extends."

Both majority and minority agreed in asserting

1. That the Personal Liberty laws of the free states "are hostile in their character, subversive of the Constitution, and revolutionary in their effect."

2. That Cuba ought to be acquired by the United States.

3. That a railroad ought to be built to the Pacific.

Their agreement was a minor matter. Their disagreement was so serious that when the minority could not have its way, it left the convention, met in another hall, and adopted its resolutions.

The majority of the convention then adjourned to meet at Baltimore, June 18. 1860. As it was then apparent that Douglas would be nominated, another split occurred, and the few Southern men attending, together with some Northern delegates, withdrew. Those who remained nominated Stephen A. Douglas and Herschel V. Johnson.

The second group of seceders met in Baltimore, adopted the platform of the first group of seceders from the Charleston convention, and nominated John C. Breckinridge, of Kentucky, and Joseph Lane, of Oregon.

[Illustration: A Lincoln]

%401. The Constitutional Union Party.%—Meanwhile (May 9) another party, calling itself the National Constitutional Union party, met at Baltimore. These men were the remnants of the old Whig and American or Know-nothing parties. They nominated John Bell, of Tennessee, and Edward Everett, of Massachusetts, and declared for "the Constitution of the country, the union of the states, and the enforcement of the laws."

%402. Election of Lincoln.%—The Republican party met in convention at Chicago on May 16, and nominated Abraham Lincoln, and Hannibal Hamlin of Maine. It

1. Repudiated the principles of the Dred Scott decision.

2. Demanded the admission of Kansas as a free state.

3. Denied all sympathy with any kind of interference with slavery in the states.

4. Insisted that the territories must be kept free.

5. Called for a railroad to the Pacific, and a homestead law.

The election took place in November, 1860. Of 303 electoral votes cast,
Lincoln received 180; Breckinridge, 72; Bell, 39; and Douglas, 12.