sition with credit for two years, he was then chosen by Governor Reynolds to fill the vacancy in the United States Senate, occasioned by the death of Dr. Lewis Lynn. In 1844 he was elected to the same position by the State Legislature, and re-elected in 1849.

Mr. Atchison, being President of the Senate at the time of the death of Hon. William R. King, the Vice-President elect, became ex-officio Vice-President of the United States.

In 1851, when the question of organizing the Nebraska Territory was broached in the United States Senate, Mr. Atchison opposed it. At the next session, however, of the same Congress he favored it, though the validity of the Missouri Compromise had not yet been questioned. But it was his intention and that of his constituents to introduce slavery into this Territory regardless of prohibitions. He could not, however, satisfy his Southern friends of his success in the undertaking, and the bill failed.

In the summer of 1853 he boldly announced himself in favor of the repeal of the Missouri Compromise, and preached in the purest orthodoxy the principles of Popular Sovereignty. And consequently the following winter in the Senate he was a warm supporter of the Kansas-Nebraska bill.

Ile aspired to the Presidency of the United States, and for some time had his name in the Border papers as a candidate. He ran for the United States Senate at the March election in 1855, but was badly defeated. The year after his defeat he spent the most of his time in Kansas leading the Platte County Rifle Company, whose exploits will be duly recorded. After the defeat of slavery in Kansas he retired to his farm about seven miles from Weston, Missouri, where he yet resides, taking no part in politics.

In the fall of 1853, therefore, the people of Western Missouri resolved that Kansas should be a Slave State at all hazards. The question of making it a Slave State was then for the first time raised, and that, too, by a gentleman who understood that the Missouri Compromise would be repealed.

The minds of the people had been prepared for the struggle; the pecuniary interest of the wealthy demanded it; the dependent poor, obsequious to the rich, stood ready to do their bidding, and all prided themselves in maintaining the institutions and honor of Missouri.

When the Missouri Compromise was repealed the impression was made upon the minds of the people of north-west Missouri that the organization of the Territories and the removal of the slavery restriction was a kind of "compromise measure" by which there was an implicit understanding that Kansas should be a Slave State. This was the prevailing, natural, and, in many instances, the sincere and honest impression which pervaded pretty generally the minds of all classes on the Border. This fact may serve to palliate, in some degree, their subsequent conduct.*

The people of the Free States who were the first to favor the organization of Nebraska Territory, never dreamed that an effort would be made to introduce slavery therein until the session of the thirty-third Congress the following winter. There were two large parties in the Middle and Eastern States opposed to Slavery, both radical in principle, but one favoring a prudent, the other a fanatical policy. One opposed the extension and growth of Slavery by all Constitutional means; the other believed the ends would justify the means of its total abolition. Both were equally opposed to yielding Kansas to Slavery, and both resolved to rescue her from its grasp.

From Dr. J. H. Strongfellow's testimony before the Congressional Committee, the following is taken;

At the time of the passage of that bill, and prior to that time, I never heard any man in my section of Missouri express a doubt about the nature of the institutions that would be established here, provided that the Missouri restriction was removed: and I heard of no combination of persons, either in public or private, prior to the time of the organization of the Emigrant Aid Society, and, indeed, for months afterwards. for the purpose of making united action to frustrate the designs of that society in abolitionizing or making a free State of Kansas. The conviction was general that it would be a Slave State. The settlers who come over from Missouri after the passage of the bill, as far as I know, generally believed that Kansas would be a Slave State

The friends of Free Labor defeated and overwhelmed in Congress, resolved to renew the conflict on the distant fields of Kansas. Though borne down by an unjust and unfair legislation, they determined "to possess the goodly land" by emigration and settlement-the very mode prescribed by Congress.

The devotees of Slavery entered upon this struggle with many advantages. The Organic act was skillfully framed with this end in view. Slavery was already in the Territory and had been for many years, in violation of the laws of the United States. The Government officials, missionaries and traders among the Indians held slaves and had sought to impress the native inhabitants with its attractions, some of whom held slaves.* It was regarded by the friends of slavery, and conceded by its opponents, that the Organic act establishing the Territory, recognized the right to hold slaves in the same; and that neither the people nor the Territorial Legislature could prohibit slavery; that power was alone possessed by the people when they were authorized to frame a State Government "It was contended that the removal of the Slavery restriction virtualty established slavery in the Territory." The whole weight and influence of the General Government was ready to be employed in the interest of Slavery. Every officer in the Territory was to be appointed by the President. Missouri lying contiguous to this Territory, enabled her people to pass easily and quickly over and lay out their claims, preparatory to emigrating. It was not in the line of emigration from the Free States, being too far south; whereas up the Mississippi and Missouri the tide of slave emigration had been for years pressing.

Thus stood the sectional parties when the "Irrepressible

These facts are gathered from old settlers. Joe Parks, a chief among the Shawnees and Choeteau, near Westport, each owned three slaves. Revs. Messrs, Perry and Johnson. missionaries among the Delawares and Shawnees, owned several apiece.Slaves must bave been held here twenty years previous to 1854,

Conflict," which had been waged since the childhood of the Thirteen Colonies, was transferred from the Legislative Halls of the nation to the fair and virgin prairie of Kansas, to be renewed with the fury and desperateness of the death grapple.

CHAPTER X.

PRO-SLAVERY EMIGRATION AND EMIGRANT AID SOCIETIES.

In the early part of May before the Territory was thrown open to settlement, the people from the western border of Missouri began coming over and locating their claims upon the best sites in the country. They would mark them with stakes, or four poles thrown quadrangularly upon the ground, as the initium of a cabin, and then return to their homes -some to prepare to emigrate, others merely to watch and hold their newly acquired possessions. Thus they continued to scatter themselves over the best country of Eastern Kansas, in many instances disregarding the Indian title by which the lands were held, until almost every gentleman in Western Missouri had a claim upon which he had moved, intended to move, or designed to hold.*

Immediately after the intelligence of the passage of the Nebraska-Kansas Act was communicated to Western Missouri, some of the leading politicians in that quarter crossed over into Kansas and held meetings among the Squatters.At one held on Salt Creek, June 10th, 1854, the following Preamble and Resolutions were adopted:

"Whereas, We, the citizens of Kansas Territory, and many

*In the Democratic Platform published in Liberty, Missouri, of June 8th, 1854, we find the following:

"We learn from a gentleman lately from the Territory of Kansas, that a great many Missourians have already set their 'meg' in that country, and are making arrangements to 'darken the atmosphere' with their negroes. This is right; let every man that owns a negro go there and settle, and our northern brethren will be com pelled to hunt further north for a location."