LUCRETIA MOTT (1793-1880.)
The advance agent of emancipation.
Meanwhile, the slavery question was busy at its work of disintegration. The Democratic party was held together for a time by the Compromise of 1850, to the effect that the inhabitants of the new Territories of New Mexico and Utah should be left to decide for themselves the question of slavery. In a few years the settlements in Nebraska and Kansas made it necessary to erect territorial governments there, and the question of slavery was thus brought before Congress again. The Missouri Compromise forbade slavery forever in those sections, for both of them lie to the north parallel of 36° 30'. Stephen A. Douglas, however, and a number of other Democratic leaders in Congress claimed that the Compromise of 1850 nullified this agreement, and that the same freedom of choice should be given to the citizens of Kansas and Nebraska as was given to those in Utah and New Mexico. This policy was called "Squatter Sovereignty."
THE MISSOURI COMPROMISE.
The bill was bitterly fought in Congress, but it passed the Senate by a vote of thirty-seven to fourteen, and after another fierce struggle was adopted in the House by a vote of 113 to 100. It received several amendments, and the President signed it May 31, 1854. Thus the Missouri Compromise was repealed and the first note of civil war sounded. The question of slavery was opened anew, and could never be closed without the shedding of blood to an extent that no one dreamed.
FORMATION OF THE REPUBLICAN PARTY.
The enforcement of the fugitive slave law was resisted in the North and numerous conflicts took place. During the attempted arrest of Anthony Burns in Boston a deputy-sheriff was shot dead, and Federal troops from Rhode Island had to be summoned before Burns could be returned to slavery. Former political opponents began uniting in both sections. In the North the opponents of slavery, comprising Democrats, Free-Soilers, Know Nothings, Whigs, and Abolitionists, joined in the formation of the "Anti-Nebraska Men," and under that name they elected, in 1854, a majority of the House of Representatives for the next Congress. Soon after the election, the new organization took the name of Republicans, by which they are known to-day. Its members, with a few exceptions among the Germans in Missouri and the Ohio settlers in western Virginia, belonged wholly to the North.
CIVIL WAR IN KANSAS.
Kansas became for the time the battle-ground between slavery and freedom. Societies in the North sent emigrants into Kansas, first furnishing them with Bibles and rifles, while the pro-slavery men swarmed thither from Missouri, and the two parties fought each other like Apache Indians. In the midst of the civil war, a territorial legislature was formed, and in many instances the majority of the candidates elected was double that of the voting population in the district. Governor A.H. Reeder, of Pennsylvania, had been appointed governor of the Territory, and, finding himself powerless to check the anarchy, went to Washington in April, 1855, to consult with the government. While there he was nominated for Congress, and defeated by the fraudulent votes of the pro-slavery men.