Evie Peterson
Thomas
US History
December 7, 2014


The Kansas Nebraska Act

          While trying to explain the complex way in which history works nothing just happens. It's a  chain process that unravels in a complex mess that can be explained in no other way than a long explanation. History is complex and irregular, and while it can be seen from many different perspectives, the story always comes back in a morphed version of the same story.
     The Missouri Compromise involved the regulation of slavery in the western territories. It made slavery illegal in Louisiana Territory, north of the parallel 36°30′. This act, however, was repealed my the Kansas- Nebraska Act.
     Popular sovereignty is the doctrine that states that the sovereign people of a territory should determine themselves the status of slavery. This idea came into role in the creation of the Kansas- Nebraska Act.  The Kansas–Nebraska Act was created in 1854 and not only opened new lands for settlement but also created the distinct territories of Kansas and Nebraska. This act repealed the                 Missouri Compromise of 1820 because it allowed white men to determine if they would allow slavery within each area or not. Stephan Douglas was the democrat who created this act in hopes to open thousands of farms and make a Midwestern Railroad.
     The Act opened Kansas Territory and Nebraska Territory to slavery and future admission of slave states by allowing the white male settlers to make this decision through "popular sovereignty." In my opinion, these acts ultimately set up for the civil war. These are examples of the chain reaction set off by the Missouri Compromise, or possibly the even event before that.