licans declared that the Constitution gives Congress sovereign power over the Territories, that it is its right and duty to prohibit slavery in them, and that they were as a party opposed to the repeal of the Missouri Compromise. The Democrats, who had been somewhat divided on the Kansas-Nebraska question, were again united, and in their platform they approved of the Kansas-Nebraska Bill and of the principle of Squatter Sovereignty. They were successful in the election, and Buchanan and Breckinridge became President and Vice-President.

Immediately after President Buchanan's inauguration the Supreme Court of the United States gave its decision in the Dred Scott case. Dred Scott was a negro slave in Missouri, who had been taken by his master into the free State of Illinois and afterward into Minnesota, then (1838) a part of the territory in which slavery was prohibited by the Missouri Compromise of 1820. When carried back to Missouri he had been whipped for some offence, and he then sued his master for damages, claiming that his residence in Illinois and Minnesota had made him a free man. His master denied that he had any right to sue him, because he was a slave and therefore not a citizen. Dred Scott won his case in the court in Missouri, but his master appealed it and in time it came before the Supreme Court at Washington. This court decided against Dred Scott. It declared: 1. That Dred Scott was a slave and not a citizen of Missouri; 2. That his residence in Minnesota did not make him free, because the Missouri Compromise Act of 1820 was unconstitutional and void, and could not keep a slave-owner from settling in any Territory with his property; 3. That Congress had no more right to prohibit the carrying of slaves into any State or Territory than it had to prohibit the carrying of any other property, for slaves were property under the Constitution.

JAMES BUCHANAN.

It is important to understand this decision, because it

1857-'59.]

DRED SCOTT CASE.

27

resulted in a division of the Democratic Party, and finally led to the great Civil War. By the Missouri Compromise slavery had been prohibited in a part of the territory of the United States, the question being left open in the remaining part. By the Compromise of 1850 the Missouri Compromise had been done away with, and all the territory of the United States had been thrown open to slavery, subject to the principle of Squatter or Popular Sovereignty. But the Dred Scott decision went still further, and declared the right of slave-owners to carry their property (slaves) into any State or Territory of the United States. Though not liking this decision of the Supreme Court, the greater part of the Northern people were willing to obey it as the law of the land; but there were many who were as unwilling to receive it as law as they had been to acknowledge the Fugitive Slave Law. Even a large part of the Democratic party in the North, who had heretofore agreed to nearly all the claims of the South, became discontented at this new claim, and chose to divide the party rather than to give up to it.

The pro-slavery leaders had for some time foreseen that the South would be unable to secure as many States as the friends of freedom, and that their political power consequently would soon be gone. Up to 1848, when Wisconsin came into the Union, the number of the slave and the free States had been even, there being just fifteen of each, and consequently each section had an equal number of United States Senators. But the admission of California as a free State (1850) had destroyed the equilibrium, and the admission of Minnesota had added one more to the free States, making seventeen free States to fifteen slave States. This made the contest in regard to Kansas all the more bitter, and the pro-slavery men struggled with almost the energy of despair to make it a slave State. Before this time, too, they had made many efforts to secure Cuba from Spain, both by purchase and by filibustering expeditions, with the object of making slave States of it. Filibustering expeditions. were sent also to Central America, in hope of acquiring there territory fitted for slave labor. But these efforts were all in vain, and at last a strong disposition was shown by many leading men in the South to demand the reopening of the slave trade.

While the country was agitated by these various questions,

everybody was astonished to hear that a company of Abolitionists, under the lead of John Brown, had taken Harper's Ferry, in Virginia. It must be understood that the name Abolitionist was at that time a term of reproach, used only to designate those of extreme views among the opponents of slavery-who believed that slavery was in opposition to the laws of God, and that they were not morally bound to obey any human laws which upheld it. They therefore refused to obey the Fugitive Slave Law, and did all they could to aid fugitive slaves to escape by what was called the Underground Railroad-that is, the secret ways in which slaves were carried through the free States into Canada, where there was no danger of their capture. Some even went into the Southern States and tried to incite slaves to rise in rebellion against their masters and thus secure their freedom. The greater part of the Northern people, even of those who were opposed to the further extension of slavery, did not accept the views of the Abolitionists, but believed in obeying the laws, however bad they might be, trusting to secure their change in time.

John Brown was one of the most ardent of the Abolitionists, and when the struggle between the pro-slavery and the antislavery men began in Kansas, he went there with the express purpose of fighting to make Kansas a free State. He took a prominent part in the struggle, and became a leader of the free-State men against the Border Ruffians, as the Missourians who crossed over to the help of their brethren in Kansas were called. Not content with defending Kansas from their inroads, he carried the war into Missouri, and aided many slaves there to escape from their masters. At last rewards were offered for his arrest by both the Governor of Missouri and the President of the United States, and Brown, finding that his course was not liked by many of the free-State men, left Kansas and went to Canada, taking with him twelve negroes whom he had freed. In July, 1859, he settled with several of his Kansas companions on a farm near Harper's Ferry, with the intention of stirring up a general insurrection among the Virginia negroes. He probably chose this place because it was the site of one of the largest of the United States arsenals, having in it many thousand rifles, which would enable him to arm all the negroes he might free, and because it was near the mountains, with which he was

1859.]

JOHN BROWN'S RAID.

29

familiar, and into which he hoped to escape when he had armed his forces.

Brown had not intended to make the attack on Harper's Ferry until October 24, but fearing that the people had begun to suspect his designs, he determined to strike at once. With only twenty-two men, seventeen whites and five blacks, he entered the village Sunday night, October 16, about ten o'clock, and took possession of the Armory buildings, which were guarded by only

three watchmen. The houses of many of the principal citizens were then visited, and the whites taken as hostages and the blacks freed. Had Brown then gone into the mountains with what negroes he had collected, he might have escaped, but it is supposed that he expected the negroes of the surrounding country to rise and join him. This did not take place, and by noon of the next day all hope of his getting away

was gone.

JOHN BROWN.

The news of the attack, sent by telegraph, stirred up a wild alarm all over the South, and militia from the neighboring country flocked to Harper's Ferry. Soon after noon of Monday, Brown and his party were surrounded, and an attack was made on the Armory. There was a continuous cracking of rifles, the militia having posted themselves where they could shoot at the Armory windows, and Brown and his men defending themselves as well as they could. Several of Brown's men, including his two sons, having been killed or wounded, and the Armory being attacked in the rear as well as in front, he retreated, with the few men he had left, into the engine-house. When night came, and the firing had ceased, Brown had left only three unwounded white men and a half-dozen negroes who

had joined him from the neighborhood. Around them were more than fifteen hundred militia from Virginia and Maryland, and a company of United States marines, with two pieces of cannon, under command of Colonel Robert E. Lee, afterward famous as General Lee, of the Confederate Army. More troops were all the time arriving, for the number of the insurgents had been greatly exaggerated until rumor made them several hundred strong.

At seven o'clock the next morning, Tuesday, October 18, the marines burst open the door of the engine-house, using a long ladder as a battering-ram, rushed in amid a few shots,

HENRY A. WISE.

which wounded several of them, and in a few minutes all of the insurgents who were alive were prisoners. The next day Brown, who was badly wounded, and three of his white companions, were taken to Charlestown jail. He was brought to trial, October 27, for conspiring with negroes to produce insurrection, for treason against Virginia, and for murder; was found guilty on all the charges, and was hanged at Charlestown, Virginia (now West Virginia), December 2, 1859. During all the time between his capture and his execution Brown exhibited the utmost calmness and firmness, and never complained of his lot nor expressed any sorrow for what he had done. His conduct won the praise of his bitterest enemies, who, though they saw nothing to commend in his foolish attempt, could not but admire the coolness and bravery with which he had conducted it. Even Governor Wise, of Virginia, who had gone to Harper's Ferry at the news of the attack, afterward said in a speech in Richmond: "Colonel Washington said that Brown was the coolest man he ever saw in defying death and danger. With one son dead by his side, and another shot through, he felt the pulse of his dying son with one hand, held his rifle with the other, and commanded his men with the ut