Chapter 25: Stephen Douglas Leads the Movement to Open the West

Douglas rises from political successes in Illinois to national leadership in the Democrat Party in the early 1840’s. He chairs the Committee on Territories as of 1847 and is determined to open land in the Mississippi Valley. His eye is particularly on the Iowa Territory directly west of his property in Chicago, which he hopes will become the hub for an intercontinental railroad.

To achieve his ends, Douglas needs to convince a band of powerful Southern politicians – Hunter and Murray of Virginia, Butler of South Carolina and Missouri’s Rice — that the move is also in their best interests.

He does so by signaling his support for the further expansion of slavery.

But his Southern colleagues are not yet convinced that Douglas can keep his promise. Even though he will soon become a clandestine beneficiary of a Mississippi cotton plantation owned by his wife.