It broke the line of Southern victories. It
neutralized the effect of the whole territorial movement up to that
point. It completely spoiled the slaveholders' well-laid plans. We
will always give Grant and his men all praise for victories leading up
to Appomatox, but, in some respects, the most important victory of the
great conflict was won on the plains of Kansas by John Brown of
Ossawattomie and his Abolition associates.
The most sagacious Southern leaders saw in that result conclusive
proof that the scale was turned. They realized that they were beaten
within the lines of the Union, and they began to arrange for going out
of it. They helped to elect a Republican President by dividing the
Democratic party in 1860 between two candidates--Douglas and
Breckenridge--in order that they might have a plausible pretext for
secession.
But the slaveholders had not abandoned the other policy to which
reference has been made--that of carrying their institution, by main
force, as it were, into some, if not all, of the free States. To that
end they had, in sporting parlance, a card up their sleeves which they
proceeded to play.
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