> I opined:
>
> <<It [the Republican Party] was founded to assert federal soverignity over
> the states and to free the slaves.>>
and Julius ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote - and before you read on, he is absolutely
right, in fact this morning I was thinking about the Free Soil Party and when
was the last time I thought of them? - so thank you Julius for your further and
corrective word.
(the Rev) Vince, who lives near one of the two purported birthplaces of the
Republican Party, Jackson, Michigan (Ripon, Wisconsin being the other claimant)
>
>
> I agree with the gist of your chronology, Vince, but this statement calls for
> elaboration. The Republican party was formed, primarily, to oppose *the
> expansion of slavery* into the new Western Territories under the
> Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854. The act provided that the question of slavery
> in the proposed territories of Kansas and Nebraska would be left to the
> residents of each territory. This enraged many because it repealed the
> Compromise of 1820, which banned slavery in that area.
>
> The Republican Party was organized as an answer to the divided politics,
> political turmoil, arguments and internal division, particularly over the
> Kansas-Nebraska Act and slavery, that plagued the many existing political
> parties in the United States in 1854. The new party's platform was opposed to
> the expansion of slavery in the Territories under the act, to be sure, but
> did not endeavor to "free the slaves."
>
> I split hairs on the distinction because opposition to the Kansas-Nebraska
> act, the primary impetus for the formation of the Republican party, was not
> based solely on the abolitionist cause. For instance, staunchly democratic
> Southern Illinois was angered at the act because residents feared that
> opening Kansas to slaveholders would prevent the settlement of small farmers
> like themselves. Violently negrophobic, voters in this section wanted
> nothing to do with abolitionism. Others who would become Republicans were
> hostile to Kansas-Nebraska, but had no desire to see that opposition
> translated into the general anti-slavery movement.
>
> The Free Soil Party, asserting that all had a natural right to the soil,
> demanded that the government re-evaluate homesteading legislation and grant
> land to settlers free of charge. The Conscience Whigs, the "radical" faction
> of the Whig Party in the North, alienated themselves from their Southern
> counterparts by adopting an anti-slavery expansion position. All these
> groups, which had been marching under different banners, became Republicans.
>
> -Julius
