The
Kansas–Nebraska Act of 1854 created the territories of
Kansas and
Nebraska by
Democratic Senator
Stephen A. Douglas of
Illinois. The initial purpose of the Kansas–Nebraska Act was to open up many thousands of new farms and make feasible a Midwestern
Transcontinental Railroad. The popular sovereignty clause of the law led pro- and anti-slavery elements to flood into Kansas with the goal of voting slavery up or down, resulting in
Bleeding Kansas.