Introduction
The years preceding the American Civil War were characterized by legislative efforts designed to appease conflicting parties and enhance national cohesion. The Kansas-Nebraska Act dismissed the Missouri Compromise and gave slave owners the right to demand and give back their fugitives.
Consequently, the abolitionists started campaigning to repeal the Act, which intensified enmity and resulted in the Antislavery Republican Party in the North. Moreover, it led to a fierce debate among politicians on the meaning of freedom and the position of African Americans in American society. Although the Act was an independent event, it stirred up conflicts, created a sense of urgency on the issue of slavery, and changed the border lines that created conflicts leading to the Civil War.
Discussion
The Kansas-Nebraska Act created a sense of urgency in resolving the issues affecting the country, mostly freedom for black people. Senator Stephen Douglas of Illinois repealed the Missouri Compromise in his final Kansas-Nebraska bill, which was then passed in May of 1854 (Egerton, 2018). People from the opposing sides rushed to Kansas in large numbers to influence the results of the first election. The result was an intense conflict that turned violent and led to the area being dabbed “bleeding Kansas” (“Kansas-Nebraska,” 2022). Thus, the violence escalated quickly as each activist group pushed for its agenda.
Furthermore, the Act determined new territories and influenced those that were free states causing tension. The Act led to dividing Missouri into two regions, Nebraska and Kansas. Moreover, the Act overrode the Missouri Compromise, which had made slavery illegal for Louisiana territories above a latitude of 36º30’ (“Kansas-Nebraska,” 2022). The other direct impact was that some states felt their future was at stake and refused to rejoin the Union, including states such as North Carolina, Virginia, Tennessee, and Arkansas (Conlin, 2019). It became had to hold the Union together and find sustainable solutions to status of States as free states.
Notably, slaves were critical to the Northern States, where Agriculture was the primary economic activity. At the same time, abolitionist activists were pressing for freedom creating a conflict of interest that eventually led to the American Civil War. Given that states were given sovereign power, activists from either side, pro-slavery and antislavery, flooded territories intending to sway votes. The tension would later intensify up to the Civil War period.
The other issue with the Act is that it empowered the local whites to determine the status of slavery in their regions. In other words, “decision-making power about slavery had become synonymous with popular sovereignty” (Kautzer, 2020, p.2). The antislavery activists, such as Frederick Douglass and Abraham Lincoln, insisted that true sovereignty is where everyone has a right to self-governance. Other leaders, such as Senator Edward Everett, became sick as they perceived the Act as taking them backward (Conlin, 2019). The conflict of interest led to several campaigns which stirred up people to go to war in an endeavor to end slavery and preserve the dignity of all people.
Conclusion
In conclusion, the Kansas-Nebraska Act was not directly responsible for the Civil War. However, its existence intensified the tension on the issue of slavery and its abolition, created a sense of urgency, and led to a further reconstruction of territories. The political reaction that the people had after the passing of the bill stirred up the conflict leading to the war. The effect of the law changed the landscape and politics of the United States in ways that are still felt today.
References
Conlin, M. F. (2019). The constitutional origins of the American Civil War. Cambridge University Press.
Egerton, D. R. (2018). The F street mess: How southern Senators rewrote the Kansas-Nebraska Act. Journal Storage 19(2), 207-209. Web.
Kansas-Nebraska Act (1854). (2022). National Archives. Web.
Kautzer, C. (2020). The self-defeating notion of the sovereign subject in US gun culture. Journal Storage, 9(1), 1-4. Web.