The correct answer to this open question is the following.
The United States Congress passed the Kansas Nebraska Act on May 30, 1854. This piece of legislation authorized people from Nebraska and Kansas to chose if they wanted to have slaves in their territory or not. The Kansas and Nebraska Act was created to revoke the Missouri Compromise created in 1820. This compromise was well received by some bot critiqued by others because it did not authorize slavery north of latitude 36o 30'. The Kansas and Nebraska Act divided the people from the North and South felt about it. Those were the previous years to the beginning of the Civil War in a country so divided. The northern states supported abolition. The southern states supported slavery.
