Bleeding Kansas

Bleeding Kansas
Part of the prelude to the American Civil War

1856 map showing slave states (gray), free states (pink), and territories (green) in the United States, with the Kansas Territory in center (white)
Date1854 (1854)–1861; 163 years ago (1861)
Location
Kansas Territory
Result

Antislavery settler victory

  • Kansas admitted to the Union as a free state
  • Fighting continues into the American Civil War
Belligerents

Antislavery settlers
(Free-Staters)

Supported by:

Pro-slavery settlers (Border ruffians)

Supported by:
Commanders and leaders
John Brown No centralized leadership
Casualties and losses
Disputed – 100+[2] 80 or fewer; 20–30 killed[2]
Events leading to the American Civil War
  1. Northwest Ordinance
  2. Kentucky and Virginia Resolutions
  3. End of Atlantic slave trade
  4. Missouri Compromise
  5. Tariff of 1828
  6. Nat Turner's Rebellion
  7. Nullification crisis
  8. End of slavery in British colonies
  9. Texas Revolution
  10. United States v. Crandall
  11. Gag rule
  12. Commonwealth v. Aves
  13. Murder of Elijah Lovejoy
  14. Burning of Pennsylvania Hall
  15. American Slavery As It Is
  16. United States v. The Amistad
  17. Prigg v. Pennsylvania
  18. Texas annexation
  19. Mexican–American War
  20. Wilmot Proviso
  21. Nashville Convention
  22. Compromise of 1850
  23. Uncle Tom's Cabin
  24. Recapture of Anthony Burns
  25. Kansas–Nebraska Act
  26. Ostend Manifesto
  27. Bleeding Kansas
  28. Caning of Charles Sumner
  29. Dred Scott v. Sandford
  30. The Impending Crisis of the South
  31. Panic of 1857
  32. Lincoln–Douglas debates
  33. Oberlin–Wellington Rescue
  34. John Brown's raid on Harpers Ferry
  35. Virginia v. John Brown
  36. 1860 presidential election
  37. Crittenden Compromise
  38. Secession of Southern states
  39. Peace Conference of 1861
  40. Corwin Amendment
  41. Battle of Fort Sumter

Bleeding Kansas, Bloody Kansas, or the Border War, was a series of violent civil confrontations in Kansas Territory, and to a lesser extent in western Missouri, between 1854 and 1859. It emerged from a political and ideological debate over the legality of slavery in the proposed state of Kansas.

The conflict was characterized by years of electoral fraud, raids, assaults, and murders carried out in the Kansas Territory and neighboring Missouri by proslavery "border ruffians" and retaliatory raids carried out by antislavery "free-staters". According to Kansapedia of the Kansas Historical Society, 56 political killings were documented during the period,[3] and the total may be as high as 200.[4] It has been called a Tragic Prelude, or an overture, to the American Civil War, which immediately followed it.

The conflict centered on the question of whether Kansas, upon gaining statehood, would join the Union as a slave state or a free state. The question was of national importance because Kansas's two new senators would affect the balance of power in the U.S. Senate, which was bitterly divided over the issue of slavery. The Kansas–Nebraska Act of 1854 called for popular sovereignty: the decision about slavery would be made by popular vote of the territory's settlers rather than by legislators in Washington, D.C. Existing sectional tensions surrounding slavery quickly found focus in Kansas.[5][6]

Missouri, a slave state since 1821, was populated by many settlers with Southern sympathies and pro-slavery views, some of whom tried to influence the Kansas decision by entering Kansas and claiming to be residents. The conflict was fought politically, and between civilians, where it eventually degenerated into brutal gang violence and paramilitary guerrilla warfare.

Kansas had a state-level civil war that would soon be replicated on a national basis. It had two different capitals (proslavery Lecompton and antislavery Lawrence, then Topeka), two different constitutions (the proslavery Lecompton Constitution and the antislavery Topeka Constitution), and two different legislatures (the so-called "bogus legislature" in Lecompton and the antislavery body in Lawrence). Both sides sought and received help from outside, the proslavery side from the federal government: Presidents Franklin Pierce and James Buchanan openly helped the proslavery partisans.[1] Both claimed to reflect the will of the people of Kansas. The proslavers used violence and threats of violence, and the free-soilers responded in kind. After much commotion, including a congressional investigation, it became clear that a majority of Kansans wanted Kansas to be a free state, but this required congressional approval, which Southerners in Congress blocked.

Kansas was admitted to the Union as a free state the same day that enough Southern senators had departed, during the secession crisis that led to the Civil War, to allow it to pass (effective January 29, 1861). Partisan violence continued along the Kansas–Missouri border for most of the war, although Union control of Kansas was never seriously threatened. Bleeding Kansas demonstrated that armed conflict over slavery was unavoidable. Its severity made national headlines, which suggested to the American people that the sectional disputes were unlikely to be resolved without bloodshed, and it, therefore, acted as a preface to the American Civil War.[7] The episode is commemorated with numerous memorials and historic sites.

  1. ^ a b c "Bleeding Kansas". History.com. April 7, 2021.
  2. ^ a b Watts, Dale (1995). "How Bloody Was Bleeding Kansas? Political Killings in Kansas territory, 1854–1861" (PDF). Kansas History. pp. 116–129. Archived (PDF) from the original on June 27, 2012. Retrieved January 9, 2009.
  3. ^ "Bleeding Kansas". Kansapedia. Kansas Historical Society. 2016. Archived from the original on January 16, 2021. Retrieved January 17, 2021.
  4. ^ Finkelman, Paul (Spring 2011). "A Look Back at John Brown". Prologue Magazine. Vol. 43, no. 1. Archived from the original on June 23, 2016. Retrieved September 11, 2021.
  5. ^ "Bleeding Kansas". American Battlefield Trust. February 14, 2019. Retrieved December 5, 2022.
  6. ^ "Bleeding Kansas (article)". Khan Academy. Retrieved December 5, 2022.
  7. ^ Etcheson, Nicole. "Bleeding Kansas: From the Kansas–Nebraska Act to Harpers Ferry". Civil War on the Western Border: The Missouri–Kansas Conflict, 1854–1865. The Kansas City Public Library. Archived from the original on July 22, 2018. Retrieved July 21, 2018.