It added to
the ferment which the Pro-Slavery Oligarchists of the South--and
especially those of South Carolina--were intent upon increasing, until
so grave and serious a crisis should arrive as would, in their opinion,
furnish a justifiable pretext in the eyes of the World for the
contemplated Secession of the Slave States from the Union.
Under the inspiration of the Slave Power, and in the direct line of the
Dred Scott decision, and of the "victorious" doctrine of Senator
Douglas, which he held not inconsistent therewith, that the people of
any Territory of the United States could do as they pleased as to the
institution of Slavery within their own limits, and if they desired the
institution, they had the right by local legislation to "protect and
encourage it," the Legislature of the Territory of New Mexico at once
(1859) proceeded to enact a law "for the protection of property in
Slaves," and other measures similar to the prevailing Slave Codes in the
Southern States.
The aggressive attitude of the South--as thus evidenced anew--naturally
stirred, to their very core, the Abolition elements of the North; on the
other hand, the publication of Hinton Rowan Helper's "Impending Crisis,"
which handled the Slavery question without gloves, and supported its
views with statistics which startled the Northern mind, together with
its alleged indorsement by the leading Republicans of the North,
exasperated the fiery Southrons to an intense degree.
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