By the 1850s there were urgent demands to organize the western territories. ... Nebraska territory, which lay north of the 1820 Missouri Compromise line where slavery was prohibited.
Douglas introduced his revised bill—and the storm began. Ohio senator Salmon Chase denounced the bill as “a gross violation of a sacred pledge.” In a published broadside, Charles Sumner’s antislavery coalition attacked Douglas, arguing that his bill would make the new territories “a dreary region of despotism, inhabited by masters and slaves.” The fierce drama climaxed in the early morning hours of March 4. “You must provide for continuous lines of settlement from the Mississippi Valley to the Pacific Ocean,” Douglas pleaded in a final address. Do not “fetter the limbs of [this] young giant.” At 5:00 in the morning, the Senate voted 37-14 to pass the Nebraska bill. It became law on May 30, 1854.