The Republican Party platform stated that slavery would not be allowed to spread any further into the territories. The Republicans also promised to support tariffs that protected Northern industry, a Homestead Act granting free farmland in the West to settlers, and the funding of a transcontinental railroad.
It was <span>France and Britain that both tried to claim this territory. The French and the British were in conflict due to land competition throughout the colonial period. </span>
During the earliest days of the American Revolution, General Washington believed that "c. soldiers’ short enlistment periods doomed colonial chances of victory", since he knew that the prospects of the US winning an early victory were slim.
