ShmoopTube

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[ musical flourish ]

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And here's your Shmoop du jour, brought to you by popular sovereignty,

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the trendiest form of self-determination.

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Get that? All right, well, check out the map.

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Slaves. Bad.

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All right, how did the creation of Kansas - right here -

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affect the country's political landscape?

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And here are the potential answers.

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[ glass breaks ]

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[ mumbles ]

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[ mumbling continues ]

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All right. Let's start with how exactly Kansas

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came to be. Like what was the IPO of Kansas.com.

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Well, in 1854 Congress passed the

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Kansas-Nebraska Act, which allowed residents to vote

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on whether or not slavery would be allowed

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in the new Kansas territory.

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Well, since this was taking place just a few years

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before the Civil War, you better believe things got a little heated.

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Let's see which answer best describes what took place.

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Did the creation of Kansas affect the landscape by A -

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deescalating political tensions?

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Huh. Quite the opposite actually. [ buzz ]

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The addition of another free state would have

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tilted the balance away from slavery. So it stoked

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tensions between the slave owners and abolitionists.

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That knocks out A and D. Bye.

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Did the creation of Kansas C -

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disillusion voters and hurt voter turnout?

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Well, there were many problems when Kansas arrived on the scene,

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but poor voter turnout was not one of them.

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In fact, supporters of both sides flooded the state

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hoping to swing the outcome of the election in their direction.

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Which means the creation of Kansas affected the political landscape

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by B - leading to the creation of sectional parties.

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[ party horn sounds ]

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Slavery was such a contentious issue

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that the traditional two-party political system

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could no longer support the intricacies

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and fervor of the debate.

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Smaller sectional parties began cropping up

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across the country - most notably the Republican party

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which was founded in opposition to slavery.

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You know the Kansas-Nebraska split was so intense,

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we wonder what happened to drive a wedge

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between the Dakotas. Hmm.

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[ party horn sounds ]

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