8/7/2019 bloodshed leads to war

1/2

Andrew Rogers

African American History Essay

Bloodshed Leads to War

Action taken by the federal government could have prevented the bloodshed in the

fledgling state of Kansas. Their failure to do so led to an incident known as Bleeding Kansas

and a major precursor to the Civil War. In the case of John Brown, a strongly opinionated

abolitionist, is outright murder ever justified? The larger question regarding the federal

governments ability to abolish slavery will recount the incidents that include the Kansas

Nebraska Act, the Emigrant Aid Company, pro- versus antislavery legislation government, the

fiery, passionate, moving speech of Charles Sumner and the horrific relation toward him.

The Compromise of 1850 gave Americans false hope regarding whether the issue of

slavery had been resolved. The Election of Franklin Pierce on 1852 resulted in his efforts to

settle the disputes between North and South. Those who had supported the Compromise of 1850

felt that the government should not have passed the Fugitive Slave Act, which stated that all

were obligated to assist in the capture and return of fugitive slaves.

The Kansas Nebraska Act, passed in 1854, stated that the Missouri Compromise was no

longer in effect, and that popular sovereignty, which gave the individual states the power to

decide the issue of slavery within their boundaries, would solve the issue of Free State versus

Slave State. Oppositions to this act were not only on moral grounds, but on economic as well. A

potential employer in a Slave State would most likely not hire white workers, which he or she

would have to pay repeatedly, but would use slave labor, which was a one-time-fee, so to

speak. This act caused the forces for and against slavery to set the stage for a bloody feud.

8/7/2019 bloodshed leads to war

2/2

This feud started in a diplomatic way. The Northern Government established the

Emigrant Aid Company, which encouraged antislavery settlers to move into Kansas, in hopes

that they would cast votes in the favor of freedom. In response to this Southerners then

encouraged their own to move to Kansas. These opposing views led to two separate legislation

governments in Kansas, and caused a small scale Civil War that soon became known as

Bleeding Kansas.

It started when proslavery fanatics from Missouri burned an antislavery settlement in

Lawrence, Kansas. To avenge this violence, abolitionist John Brown mutilated and murdered

five men in a proslavery settlement along the Pottawatomie Creek. This soon was deemed the

Pottawatomie Massacre. These acts of violence sparked Southern resistance, enraged Northern

sensibilities, and were soon in the Newspaper by the name of Bleeding Kansas.

In his Crime Against Kansas speech, Charles Sumner called slavery a code of death

and trampling upon all established liberties . He also harshly criticized the proslavery senator

Andrew Butler, which led to Sumner being severely beaten with a cane (until it broke) by

Preston Brooks, who was a relative of Butler. Said beating was so debilitating that Sumner was

not fully recovered for year to come. Southern sympathizers saw the cane as a symbol of the

proslavery movement, giving replacement canes to Brooks as a token of their approval. The

savage behavior of a southern politician, along with the backdrop of Bleeding Kansas actually

helped bolster the abolitionist movement across the expanding nation.

The federal government had the ability to prevent this bloody precursor to the Civil War.

For example, they could have more deeply considered the Fugitive Slave Act, for retaliation on

an act that could be considered violation of personal rights was obvious.