Territorial Politics In Frontier Missouri 1804 1820

Author : Frederick Easton Whitten
Publisher :
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 158 pages
Book Rating : 4.:/5 (323 download)

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Download or read book The Platte Purchase and Its Significance in Frontier History written by Frederick Easton Whitten and published by . This book was released on 1952 with total page 158 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Missouri's struggle for statehood, known in American history as the "Missouri Question", ended with her admission to the Union as one of the provisions of the Missouri Compromise of 1820. The Compromise was, as its name suggests, a give and take agreement between contending forces, the principal issue being the extension of slavery in newly acquired territory. The rapid growth of the new state of Missouri and the discovery and settlement of its fertile river valleys resulted in a great wave of new settlers moving up the Missouri River Valley and its tributaries. They soon reached the western frontier, and then became convinced that the hastily designated boundary was a mistake in that it denied to settlement fertile valleys coveted by the home-seekers. Here was enacted another chapter of the history of the American frontier. The discovery of the fertility of the valley of the Little Platte centered attention on that section. Since Missouri was admitted as a slave state, many of her citizens owned slaves and wished to take them into the Platte Valley. The terms of the Missouri Compromise prohibited slavery to the west and north of the state, and unless a modification of the Compromise could be effected slaves could not be taken into the valley. An answer was found in the extension of the boundary to include the Little Platte country. It is to the means employed, the forces involved, the steps taken and the results obtained in bringing about the extension of the boundary that this study is directed. The extension of the boundary to include the Little Platte was admittedly a violation of the Missouri Compromise. In view of the existing sectional hostility and the bitterness resulting from the debates on the compromise itself, how was it brought about? The explanations of the historians differ widely. Some allege that it was a result of a conspiracy on the part of slave-holders to extend the territory under their control; others see in it an act of generosity by northern leaders to avoid threatened secession; still others see in it a necessary step to bring law and order to the Missouri frontier; and it is suggested by others that it was only a matter of local interest, and slipped by without notice. It is believed that a careful scrutiny of the above explanations will disclose their inadequacy. An examination of the political situation on the national level and the aims and ambitions of political leaders in those strenuous times will convince the most sceptical that the reason for the ease with which Missouri extended her boundary in the face of the Compromise was possible only because the leaders of the dominant Democratic party played down the slavery issue and consented to the violation of the violation of the Compromise in the interest of party harmony. The history of national parties affords many instances where in the furtherance of party harmony, sectional issues have been played down and a middle course sought to insure party success and perpetuity. The extension of the boundary of Missouri in 1836-7 was made possible by such a policy.