| The rejection of the bill by the House. |
The Senate passed the Lecompton bill on March 23rd, 1858, by a substantial majority, but the House promptly rejected it. The House passed a measure, instead, for referring the Lecompton constitution back to the people of Kansas, who should vote freely upon it in all its parts, and for admitting Kansas, without further Congressional action, under this constitution, if it should receive the popular ratification; but the Senate rejected this substitute for its bill.
| The English bill. |
The matter was then sent to a conference committee of the two Houses. After long deliberation a measure was matured by this committee which appeared to deal with a subsidiary question only, but which, by some sort of an understanding, was held to give the people of Kansas the chance to reject the Lecompton constitution in toto at the polls. The measure is known as the English bill from its projector, Mr. W. H. English, a member of the conference committee from the House of Representatives. It provided for a reduction of the land grants from twenty-three millions of acres, asked for by Kansas under the Lecompton constitution, to about four millions of acres, and proposed the submission of this change to a vote of the people of Kansas. If the people adopted the change, they would be considered as having adopted the Lecompton constitution in toto. If, on the other hand, they rejected this change, they would be considered as having rejected this constitution in toto.
| The rejection of the Lecompton constitution by the people of Kansas. |
The English bill was agreed to by both Houses; and on August 2nd, 1858, the people of Kansas voted upon the measure. They rejected it, and with it the Lecompton constitution, by a vote of more than eleven thousand in a total vote of about thirteen thousand.