Prelude to Border Conflict

A map of the Territories of Kansas and Nebraska, created by the Kansas Nebraska Act of 1854, J. H. Colton and Co., 1856.

Kansas Territory was officially established in 1854 with the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act. Congressional debate on the act continued discussion of the question of whether or not slavery would be allowed to expand into newly opened territories. The act provided that each territory would decide the issue through the constitution under which it would enter the union. Kansas Territory, because of its proximity to Missouri, a slave state, became a political and literal battleground for pro- and antislavery forces.

The six-year struggle for control of the territory of Kansas, often called Bleeding Kansas, was a prelude to the American Civil War. It was by no means the sole cause of that conflict, but the political turmoil that emerged from the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854 caused a sometimes-violent confrontation between pro- and antislavery factions in Kansas and increased sectional tensions nationwide.  It also led to much confrontation along the Missouri/ Kansas border, with raiding and plundering taking place on both sides.  (Kansas Territorial Online)