In the thirty years leading up to the Civil War, tensions in the country ... Law for the recapture of runaways. 1854: The Kansas-Nebraska act divides the Nebraska Territory in two, and soon ...

The Democrat politician Stephen Douglas had the idea that the new territories of Kansas and Nebraska would choose for themselves whether they would become slave or free states. This meant the old ...

Franklin Pierce was the lackluster choice of the Democratic Party in 1852, nominated after 48 ballots. In a campaign devoid of issues—for example, both parties endorsed the Compromise of 1850—Pierce ...