Landmark Decisions Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 4000 words

drainage basin Decisions - Essay ExampleMaine was admitted as a assoil state, so the Senate remained equally stacked between free and slave states. Ostensibly, the line drawn at 36 degrees 30 feet of the territories acquired in the Louisiana Purchase would constantly preclude slaveholding from existing within their boundaries. Three decades later, on May 30, 1854, Congress passed the Kansas-Nebraska Act, and the contr all oversy over slavery in the territories was reopened. Congress tried repeatedly to organize a single territory for the range west of Missouri and Iowa, but was unsuccessful. Stephen O. Douglas of Illinois introduced a bill dividing the land into two territories. His proposal left the have sex of free state or slave state up to the people. Thus, ushering in the concept of popular reign. Paul Finkelman in Dred Scott v. Sanford, A Brief History with Documents, make outs the debates, the bickering and how the displeasure fermented among the pro and anti-slavery pro ponents, as the residents of Kansas became violently divided over the free state or slave state issue. He goes on to describe how the concept of popular sovereignty, was proving to be a nemesis, as the pro slavery and anti slavery proponents engaged each other in many guerilla warfare battles. He speaks of how Kansas became known as bleeding Kansas. (Finkelman)