The piece of evidence that would best support the claim that "all new territories to the US should decide for themselves whether they will be slave or free" is the Compromise of 1850, that established the precedent that new territories would choose for themselves whether to be slave or free.
Explanation:
The Compromise of 1850 was an agreement between the different states of the United States regarding the status with which the different territories obtained after the war with Mexico would enter the Union. The question was whether these states would be free or slave, and how this would affect the balance between the two groups of states in Congress. Finally, through this agreement California was admitted as a free state, while Utah and New Mexico could define their status through popular sovereignty. The most important part of this agreement was the acceptance of popular sovereignty as the defining method of determining the status of the states against slavery. This would be applied again after the sanction of the Kansas-Nebraska Act, which would lead to a prelude to the Civil War in the event known as Bleeding Kansas.
Committees help to organize the most important work of Congress — considering, shaping, and passing laws to govern the nation. 8,000 or so bills go to committee annually.
