Sectionalism was a big contributor because the north, south, and west were so different economically. Therefore, there was a struggle for power between these groups. There was also a balance of power in the legislative branch between slave and free states that each side was continuously trying to overcome by gaining more states of their orientation. A good example for this is the Kansas-Nebraska act and whether Kansas would be slave or free being left up to popular sovereignty; hordes of both free solders and slavery supporters came into Kansas to vote for their side and it eventually ended up in bloodshed