ulent voting, assembled in convention at Topeka, September 25, 1855, framed a constitution excluding slavery, and organized a rival government. Civil war broke out between the factions.

From the autumn of 1855 until the following summer the Territory was the scene of constant turmoil and violence. The people of the North held meetings to enlist additional settlers, cash poured into the Tribune fund, and food, clothing, seeds, arms and money were sent in quantities to the Free Soil settlers.

On September 8, 1856, John W. Geary, of Pennsylvania, was appointed governor. He issued a proclamation of peace, and promised the settlers protection in their persons, pursuits and property. They therefore laid down their arms. This was no sooner done than an army from the Southern States attacked Lawrence, which had before been the scene of much violence; but Gov. Geary, calling out the United States troops, finally induced the invaders to retire. On January 26, 1857, the free legislature met at Topeka, but was dispersed by the United States marshal, who captured several members and threw them into jail at Tecumseh. The pro-slavery people now met in legislature at Lecompton and adopted a resolution calling a convention to frame another State constitution.

Gov. Geary resigned because the pro-slavery United States Senate refused to uphold some of his measures, and Robert J. Walker, of Mississippi, was appointed to succeed him. Gov. Walker guaranteed protection to the settlers on election day, rejected fraudulent returns, condemned both the Lecompton constitution and the methods of promulgation, and started for Washington to prevent Congress from accepting it. The President had officially signed the instrument before the arrival of Gov. Walker, and the latter promptly resigned. J. W. Denver of California was appointed to succeed him.

An election was held for the rejection or adoption of the pro-slavery clauses of the Lecompton constitution, December 21, 1856. The Free-State men did not go to the polls, and the fraudulent instrument was therefore adopted by a vote of 6,143 to 569. The pro-slavery legislature ordered a vote for State officers under the Lecompton constitution, January 4, 1858. The settlers' legislature then submitted that constitution to the people, as a

whole, to be accepted or rejected, this election also to take place on January 4, 1858. It was rejected by a majority of 10,226. Congress, after a long discussion, again sent the Lecompton constitution to a vote of the people, and again it was rejected by a majority of 10,000 votes, on August 3, 1858. Gov. Denver then resigned, and Samuel Medary, of Ohio, succeeded him.

The settlers' legislature submitted another constitution, which was adopted. Some portions of it proving unsatisfactory, another convention was called, and at last the new constitution, forever prohibiting slavery, was promulgated at Wyandotte, July 4, 1859, and was adopted in October by a 4,000 majority.

On December

6, 1859, a State election was held under the new constitution, and Charles Robinson, who had been chosen governor under the first Topeka constitution, in 1856, was once more elected to that office. January 29, 1861, Kansas came into the Union as a free State, and ultimately Nebraska was admitted upon the same conditions.

The facts thus briefly stated constitute the civil history of the struggle in Kansas. A fratricidal war raged over her rich plains for three years. Bloodshed, robbery, devastation and fire spread like a pestilence through her humble settlements, and but a faint shadow of the fearful events of that period is cast upon these pages.

In the final adjustment of these questions in Congress, Stephen A. Douglas, of Illinois, and James S. Green, of Missouri, played a prominent part. Senator Green opposed the views of Mr. Douglas, and, as the acknowledged leader of the pro-slavery party, maintained his ground with rare ability and eloquence. Coming into the Senate, in 1857, during the discussion of the question of the admission of Kansas under the Lecompton constitution, he supported the policy of the administration in speeches distinguished not only by perspicuity of style, but by powers of argument which called forth commendations, even from those who did not share his convictions.

66 THE DRED SCOTT DECISION."

A few days after the inauguration of President Buchanan (1857), the Supreme court of the United States delivered the celebrated opinion known in American history as "The Dred Scott Decision."

Two

Dred Scott was a negro slave belonging to Dr. Emerson, who was a surgeon in the army of the United States. In 1834 Dr. Emerson took Scott from the State of Missouri to the military post at Rock Island, Ill., and held him there as a slave until April or May, 1836. At the time last mentioned, Dr. Emerson removed Scott to Fort Snelling, Minn., and there held him until 1838. At the latter place Scott was married to a colored woman who had been taken to Fort Snelling by her master in 1835, and had been subsequently sold there to Dr. Emerson. children were born of this marriage, and then the whole family were taken back to St. Louis and sold. Dred thereupon brought a complaint of assault and battery against John F. A. Sandford, the purchaser of himself, his wife and children, which was tried in the United States Circuit court for the District of Missouri. Before beginning this suit Scott had brought another in the State courts of Missouri for his freedom, on the ground that having been a resident of a free State and a free Territory, he thereby relieved himself from the chains of bondage and became a citizen of the United States. The inferior court gave judgment in his favor, but on a writ of error to the Supreme court of the State the judgment was reversed and the case remanded for a new trial. By consent this action was continued to await decision on the suit for assault and battery against Sandford, brought in the Federal court.

At the conclusion of the trial Scott's attorney asked the court to charge the jury, on the agreed statement of facts, to find for the plaintiff. This was refused, and the jury being instructed that the law was with the defendant, was ordered so to find. The verdict accordingly was that the plaintiff, his wife and children were slaves, as alleged by Sandford, and that therefore they had no rights in the court, and no redress against their master for personal violence.

Scott's attorney filed a bill of exception to the charge of the court, and thereupon carried the case by writ of error to the United States Supreme court. After a delay of nearly three years a decision was finally reached in March, 1857. Chief Justice Taney, speaking for the court, decided that negroes, whether free or slave, were not citizens of the United States, and that

they could not become such by any process known to the constitution; that under the laws of the United States a negro could neither sue nor be sued, and that therefore the court had no jurisdiction of Dred Scott's cause; that a slave was to be regarded in the light of a personal chattel, and that he might be removed from place to place by his owner as any other piece of property; that the constitution gave to every slave holder the right of removing to or through any State or Territory with his slaves, and of returning with them, at will, to a State where slavery was recognized by law; and that therefore the Missouri Compromise of 1820, as well as the compromise measures of 1850, was unconstitutional and void. In these opinions six of the associate justices of the Supreme bench-Wayne, Nelson, Grier, Daniel, Campbell and Catron-concurred; while two associates Judges McLean and Curtis-dissented. The decision of the majority, which was accepted as the opinion of the court, gave great satisfaction to the ultra slave-holding people of the South. Observing that the control of Congress and the Government was slowly passing out of their hands by the tremendous expansion of the North, and the growth of the spirit of freedom, they hoped, before it was too late, to so wall in and hedge about their peculiar institution, that future Congresses would be unable and would not dare attempt to reach it by legislative enactments.

At the North, on the contrary, the decision excited thousands of indignant comments, and much bitter opposition. This indignation could not be expended in mere words, but crystallized into a well-grounded determination to resist in the free States the enforcement of the laws of the slave States which contravened or were repugnant to their own.

EVENTS PRECEDING THE CIVIL WAR.

The presidential campaign of 1860 must ever be regarded as one of the most important in the history of the republic, as the canvass of that year was one of the most exciting. Four candidates were in the field. The Republican party nominated Abraham Lincoln, on a platform in which opposition to the further extension of slavery was declared to be the vital issue. The Democratic convention, assembled at Charleston, divided on the

question of slavery in the Territories, and, after a long and stormy session, the party was disrupted, and the "Southern Rights" delegates withdrew from the convention. They met first at Richmond and afterward at Baltimore, where they nominated for president John C. Breckinridge, of Kentucky. The squatter sovereignty Democrats nominated Stephen A. Douglas -the apostle of popular sovereignty. Still another—the “American" party, or Constitutional Unionists-chose John Bell, of Tennessee, as their candidate.

The contest resulted in the election of Mr. Lincoln. The leaders of the South had declared that his election would be considered as a just cause for the dissolution of the Union. The Government was under the control of the Douglas Democrats, but a majority of the cabinet and a large number of members of Congress in both Houses were supporters of Mr. Breckinridge, and the advocates of disunion. It was now evident that under the new administration all the departments of the Government must pass into the power of the Republican party. Disunion was now possible, but the opportunity would shortly be past. The attitude of President Buchanan favored the measure. He was not himself a disunionist, but he did not consider that he had the constitutional right to coerce a sovereign State. The interval, therefore, between the presidential election of November, 1860, and the inauguration of the following March was improved to its full extent by the political leaders of the South.

SECESSION.

On the 17th of December, 1860, a convention assembled at Charleston, S. C., passed a resolution declaring that the union hitherto existing between that State and others, under the name of the United States of America, was dissolved. The cotton-growing States were almost unanimous in support of the measure. By the 1st of February, 1861, six other States Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana and Texas had withdrawn from the Union. Nearly all the senators and representatives of those States resigned their seats in Congress, and joined the disunion cause.

In the secession conventions there was little opposition to the