reading:
For myself, I never need an excuse to learn more about history, whether recent or ancient. I ran across an essay by one Josh Zeits which touched upon the political crisis that followed the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act in 1854, a topic with which many of us are quite familiar, being that it set off the greatest crisis on United States history. But I found Professor Zeits's essay illuminating on the political landscape at that time, and how it played out in the House of Representatives.
The essay examines how the abrogation of the Missouri Compromise by the Kansas-Nebraska act upset the stability of the political alignments by bringing the expansion of slavery back as an issue of national debate. The issue that had been settled, supposedly, in 1820 by an agreement to keep slavery out of the Northern part of the Territories. Stephen Douglas, Democratic Senator from Illinois, inserted the reversal of this policy at the last minute, and the fracas broke out at once. Northern Whigs and Democrats joined forces with Free-Soilers and Know-Nothings to gain a majority in the House of Representatives, but aside from their united opposition to the extension of slavery, the goals and principles of the major factions differed in objective and focus. So it took forever to select the Speaker of the House.
Are there parallels to the crisis we face today with the capture of our government by the wealthy? All crisis share some characteristics in common, but nothing in the past is a perfect model for the present. One thing is clear; Abraham Lincoln didn't arise from nowhere to change the nation single-handed, there was a broad popular movement that needed to be fully engaged in the ensuing struggle for years.
I quote a bit of the essay, to encourage the reader to follow the link:
"In the 19th century, there was a 13-month lag between the election and swearing-in of a new Congress; consequently, the class of 1854 did not convene on Washington, D.C. until December 1855, leaving ample time for incoming members to jockey for support. “There are about thirty modest men who think the country needs their service in the Speaker’s chair,” quipped Ohio congressman Timothy Day, and “to get rid of this swarm of patriots will take time.” Out of this pack, two lead contenders emerged: Lewis Campbell, a former Whig from Ohio, and Nathaniel Banks, a former Democrat from Massachusetts. Both men left much to be desired: Campbell was a late-comer to the anti-slavery cause and, according even to his friends, “too impetuous and imperious” to unite the many factions that comprised the anti-Nebraska coalition. Banks, on the other hand, was a notorious flip-flopper who privately admitted to a close friend that he was “neither … pro slavery nor anti-slavery.” A colleague observed that Banks “is very ambitious & has always left the impression on my mind that he was not ‘nice’ as to how he ‘stayed himself up’—so [long as] he stood. I deem him cold-hearted and inclined to be scheming & sinister.” (And this, from one of his supporters.)
Read more: http://www.politico.com/...