Sumner was not a party man and was at no time in complete harmony with his coworkers. It was always a question whether his speeches had a favorable effect upon the immediate action of Congress; there can, however, be no doubt of the fact that the larger public was edified and influenced. Copies of "The Crime against Kansas" and "The Barbarism of Slavery" were printed and circulated by the million and were eagerly read from beginning to end. They gave final form to the thoughts and utterances of many political leaders both in America and in Europe. More than any other man it was Charles Sumner who, with a wealth of historical learning and great skill in forensic art, put the irrepressible conflict between slavery and freedom in its proper setting in human history.

CHAPTER XII. KANSAS AND BUCHANAN

In view of the presidential election of 1856 Northern Democrats entertained no doubts that Kansas, now occupied by a majority of free-state men, would be received as a free State without further ado. The case was different with the Democrats of western Missouri, already for ten years in close touch with those Southern leaders who were determined either to secure new safeguards for slavery or to form an independent confederacy. Their program was to continue their efforts to make Kansas a slave State or at least to maintain the disturbance there until the conditions appeared favorable for secession.

In February, 1857, the pro-slavery territorial Legislature provided for the election of delegates to a const.i.tutional convention, but Governor Geary vetoed the act because no provision was made for submitting the proposed const.i.tution to the vote of the people. The bill was pa.s.sed over his veto, and arrangements were made for registration which free-state men regarded as imperfect, inadequate, or fraudulent.

President Buchanan undoubtedly intended to do full justice to the people of Kansas. To this end he chose Robert J. Walker, a Mississippi Democrat, as Governor of Kansas. Walker was a statesman of high rank, who had been a.s.sociated with Buchanan in the Cabinet of James K. Polk. Three times he refused to accept the office and finally undertook the mission only from a sense of duty. Being aware of the fate of Governor Geary, Walker insisted on an explicit understanding with Buchanan that his policies should not be repudiated by the federal Administration. Late in May he went to Kansas with high hopes and expectations. But the free-state party had persisted in the repudiation of a Government which had been first set up by an invading army and, as they alleged, had since then been perpetuated by fraud. They had absolutely refused to take part in any election called by that Government and had continued to keep alive their own legislative a.s.sembly. Despite Walker's efforts to persuade them to take part in the election of delegates to the const.i.tutional convention, they resolutely held aloof. Yet, as they became convinced that he was acting in good faith, they did partic.i.p.ate in the October elections to the territorial Legislature, electing nine out of the thirteen councilors and twenty-four out of the thirty-nine representatives. Gross frauds had been perpetrated in two districts, and the Governor made good his promise by rejecting the fraudulent votes. In one case a poll list had been made up by copying an old Cincinnati register.

In the meantime, thanks to the abstention of the free-state people, the pro-slavery party had secured absolute control of the const.i.tutional convention. Yet there was the most absolute a.s.surance by the Governor in the name of the President of the United States that no const.i.tution would be sent to Congress for approval which had not received the sanction of a majority of the voters of the Territory. This was Walker's reiterated promise, and President Buchanan had on this point been equally explicit.

When, therefore, the pro-slavery const.i.tutional convention met at Lecompton in October, Kansas had a free-state Legislature duly elected. To make Kansas still a slave State it was necessary to get rid of that Legislature and of the Governor through whose agency it had been chosen, and at the same time to frame a const.i.tution which would secure the approval of the Buchanan Administration. Incredible as it may seem, all this was actually accomplished.

John Calhoun, who had been chosen president of the Lecompton convention, spent some time in Washington before the adjourned meeting of the convention. He secured the aid of master-hands at manipulation. Walker had already been discredited at the White House on account of his rejection of fraudulent returns at the October election of members to the Legislature. The convention was unwilling to take further chances on a matter of that sort, and it consequently made it a part of the const.i.tution that the president of the convention should have entire charge of the election to be held for its approval. The free-state legislature was disposed of by placing in the const.i.tution a provision that all existing laws should remain in force until the election of a Legislature provided for under the const.i.tution.

The master-stroke of the convention, however, was the provision for submitting the const.i.tution to the vote of the people. Voters were not permitted to accept or reject the instrument; all votes were to be for the const.i.tution either "with slavery" or "with no slavery." But the doc.u.ment itself recognized slavery as already existing and declared the right of slave property like other property "before and higher than any const.i.tutional sanction." Other provisions made emanc.i.p.ation difficult by providing in any case for complete monetary remuneration and for the consent of the owners. There were numerous other provisions offensive to free-state men. It had been rightly surmised that they would take no part in such an election and that "the const.i.tution with slavery" would be approved. The vote on the const.i.tution was set for the 21st of December. For the const.i.tution with slavery 6226 votes were recorded and 569 for the const.i.tution without slavery.

While these events were taking place, Walker went to Washington to enter his protest but resigned after finding only a hostile reception by the President and his Cabinet. Stanton, who was acting Governor in the absence of Walker, then called together the free-state Legislature, which set January 4, 1858, as the date for approving or rejecting the Lecompton Const.i.tution. At this election the votes cast were 138 for the const.i.tution with slavery, 24 for the const.i.tution without slavery, and 10,226 against the const.i.tution. But President Buchanan had become thoroughly committed to the support of the Lecompton Const.i.tution. Disregarding the advice of the new Governor, he sent the Lecompton Const.i.tution to Congress with the recommendation that Kansas be admitted to the Union as a slave State.

Here was a crisis big with the fate of the Democratic party, if not of the Union. Stephen A. Douglas had already given notice that he would oppose the Lecompton Const.i.tution. In favor of its rejection he made a notable speech which called forth the bitterest enmity from the South and arrayed all the forces of the Administration against him. Supporters of Douglas were removed from office, and anti-Douglas men were put in their places. In his fight against the fraudulent const.i.tution Douglas himself, however, still had the support of a majority of Northern Democrats, especially in the Western States, and that of all the Republicans in Congress. A bill to admit Kansas pa.s.sed the Senate, but in the House a proviso was attached requiring that the const.i.tution should first be submitted to the people of Kansas for acceptance or rejection. This amendment was finally accepted by the Senate with the modification that, if the people voted for the const.i.tution, the State should have a large donation of public land, but that if they rejected it, they should not be admitted as a State until they had a population large enough to ent.i.tle them to a representative in the lower House. The vote of the people was cast on August 2, 1858, and the const.i.tution was finally rejected by a majority of nearly twelve thousand. Thus resulted the last effort to impose slavery on the people of Kansas.

Although the war between slavery and freedom was fought out in miniature in Kansas, the immediate issue was the preservation of slavery in Missouri. This, however, involved directly the prospect of emanc.i.p.ation in other border States and ultimate complete emanc.i.p.ation in all the States. The issue is well stated in a Fourth of July address which Charles Robinson delivered at Lawrence, Kansas, in 1855, after the invasion of Missourians to influence the March election of that year, but before the beginning of b.l.o.o.d.y conflict:

"What reason is given for the cowardly invasion of our rights by our neighbors? They say that if Kansas is allowed to be free the inst.i.tution of slavery in their own State will be in danger.... If the people of Missouri make it necessary, by their unlawful course, for us to establish freedom in that State in order to enjoy the liberty of governing ourselves in Kansas, then let that be the issue. If Kansas and the whole North must be enslaved, or Missouri become free, then let her be made free. Aye! and if to be free ourselves, slavery must be abolished in the whole country, then let us accept that due. If black slavery in a part of the States is incompatible with white freedom in any State, then let black slavery be abolished from all. As men espousing the principles of the Declaration of the Fathers, we can do nothing else than accept these issues."

The men who saved Kansas to freedom were not abolitionists in the restricted sense. Governor Walker found in 1857 that a considerable majority of the free-state men were Democrats and that some were from the South. Nearly all actual settlers, from whatever source they came, were free-state men who felt that a slave was a burden in such a country as Kansas. For example, during the first winter of the occupation of Kansas, an owner of nineteen slaves was himself forced to work like a trooper to keep them from freezing; and, indeed, one of them did freeze to death and another was seriously injured.

In spite of all the advertising of opportunity and all the pressure brought to bear upon Southerners to settle in Kansas, at no time did the number of slaves in the Territory reach three hundred. The climate and the soil made for freedom, and the Governors were not the only persons who were converted to free-state principles by residence in the Territory.

CHAPTER XIII. THE SUPREME COURT IN POLITICS

The decision and arguments of the Supreme Court upon the Dred Scott case were published on March 6, 1857, two days after the inauguration of President Buchanan. The decision had been agreed upon many months before, and the appeal of the negro, Dred Scott, had been decided by rulings which in no way involved the validity of the Missouri Compromise. Nevertheless, a majority of the judges determined to give to the newly developed theory of John C. Calhoun the appearance of the sanct.i.ty of law. According to Chief Justice Taney's dictum, those who made the Const.i.tution gave to those clauses defining the power of Congress over the Territories an erroneous meaning. On numerous occasions Congress had by statute excluded slavery from the public domain. This, in the judgment of the Chief Justice, they had no right to do, and such legislation was unconst.i.tutional and void. Specifically the Missouri Compromise had never had any binding force as law. Property in slaves was as sacred as property in any other form, and slave-owners had equal claim with other property owners to protection in all the Territories of the United States. Neither Congress nor a territorial Legislature could infringe such equal rights.

According to popular understanding, the Supreme Court declared "that the negro has no rights which the white man is bound to respect." But Chief Justice Taney did not use these words merely as an expression of his own or of the Court's opinion. He used them in a way much more contemptible and inexcusable to the minds of men of strong anti-slavery convictions. He put them into the mouths of the fathers of the Republic, who wrote the Declaration of Independence, framed the Const.i.tution, organized state Governments, and gave to negroes full rights of citizenship, including the right to vote. But how explain this strange inconsistency? The Chief Justice was equal to the occasion. He insisted that in recent years there had come about a better understanding of the phraseology of the Declaration of Independence. The words, "All men are created equal," he admitted, "would seem to embrace the whole human family, and if they were used in a similar instrument at this day they would be so understood." But the writers of that instrument had not, he said, intended to include men of the African race, who were at that time regarded as not forming any part of the people. Therefore-strange logic!-these men of the revolutionary era who treated negroes actually as citizens having full equal rights did not understand the meaning of their own words, which could be comprehended only after three-quarters of a century when, forsooth, equal rights had been denied to all persons of African descent.

The ruling of the Court in the Dred Scott case came at a time when Northern people had a better idea of the spirit and teachings of the founders of the Republic regarding the slavery question than any generation before or since has had. The campaign that had just closed had been characterized by a high order of discussion, and it was also emphatically a reading campaign. The new Republican party planted itself squarely on the principles enunciated by Thomas Jefferson, the reputed founder of the old Republican party. They went back to the policy of the fathers, whose words on the subject of slavery they eagerly read. From this source also came the chief material for their public addresses. To the common man who was thus indoctrinated, the Chief Justice, in describing the sentiments of the fathers respecting slavery, appeared to be doing what Horace Greeley was wont to describe as "saying a thing and being conscious while saying it that the thing is not true."

The Dred Scott decision laid the Republicans open to the charge of seeking by unlawful means to deprive slaveowners of their rights, and it was to the partizan interest of the Democrats to stand by the Court and thus discredit their opponents. This action tended to carry the entire Democratic party to the support of Calhoun's extreme position on the slavery question. Republicans had proclaimed that liberty was national and slavery munic.i.p.al; that slavery had no warrant for existence except by state enactment; that under the Const.i.tution Congress had no more right to make a slave than it had to make a king; that Congress had no power to establish or permit slavery in the Territories; that it was, on the contrary, the duty of Congress to exclude slavery. On these points the Supreme Court and the Republican party held directly contradictory opinions.

The Democratic platform of 1856 endorsed the doctrine of popular sovereignty as embodied in the Kansas-Nebraska legislation, which implied that Congress should neither prohibit nor introduce slavery into the Territories, but should leave the inhabitants free to decide that question for themselves, the public domains being open to slaveowners on equal terms with others. But once they had an organized territorial Government and a duly elected territorial Legislature, the residents of a Territory were empowered to choose either slave labor or exclusively free labor. This at least was the view expounded by Stephen A. Douglas, though the theory was apparently rendered untenable by the ruling of the Court which extended protection to slave-owners in all the Territories remaining under the control of the general Government. It followed that if Congress had no power to interfere with that right, much less had a local territorial Government, which is itself a creature of Congress. A state Government alone might control the status of slave property. A Territory when adopting a const.i.tution preparatory to becoming a State would find it then in order to decide whether the proposed State should be free or slave. This was the view held by Jefferson Davis and the extreme pro-slavery leaders. Aided by the authority of the Supreme Court, they were prepared to insist upon a new plank in future Democratic platforms which should guarantee to all slave-owners equal rights in all Territories until they ceased to be Territories. Over this issue the party again divided in 1860.

Republicans naturally imagined that there had been collusion between Democratic politicians and members of the Supreme Court. Mr. Seward made an explicit statement to that effect, and affirmed that President Buchanan was admitted into the secret, alleging as proof a few words in his inaugural address referring to the decision soon to be delivered. Nothing of the sort, however, was ever proven. The historian Von Holst presents the view that there had been a most elaborate and comprehensive program on the part of the slavocracy to control the judiciary of the federal Government. The actual facts, however, admit of a simpler and more satisfactory explanation.

Judges are affected by their environment, as are other men. The transition from the view that slavery was an evil to the view that it is right and just did not come in ways open to general observation, and probably few individuals were conscious of having altered their views. Leading churches throughout the South began to preach the doctrine that slavery is a divinely ordained inst.i.tution, and by the time of the decision in the Dred Scott case a whole generation had grown up under such teaching.

A large proportion of Southern leaders had become thoroughly convinced of the righteousness of their peculiar system. Not otherwise could they have been so successful in persuading others to accept their views. Even before the Dred Scott decision had crystallized opinion, Franklin Pierce, although a New Hampshire Democrat of anti-slavery traditions, came, as a result of his intimate personal and political a.s.sociation with Southern leaders, to accept their guidance and strove to give effect to their policies. President Buchanan was a man of similar antecedents, and, contrary to the expectation of his Northern supporters, did precisely as Pierce had done. It is a matter of record that the arguments of the Chief Justice had captivated his mind before he began to show his changed att.i.tude towards Kansas. In August, 1857, the President wrote that, at the time of the pa.s.sage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act, slavery already existed and that it still existed in Kansas under the Const.i.tution of the United States. "This point," said he, "has at last been settled by the highest tribunal known in our laws. How it could ever have been seriously doubted is a mystery." Granted that slavery is recognized as a permanent inst.i.tution in itself-just and of divine ordinance and especially united to one section of the country-how could any one question the equal rights of the people of that section to occupy with their slaves lands acquired by common sacrifice? Such was undoubtedly the view of both Pierce and Buchanan. It seemed to them "wicked" that Northern abolitionists should seek to infringe this sacred right.

By a similar process a majority of the Supreme Court justices had become converts to Calhoun's newly announced theory of 1847. It undoubtedly seemed strange to them, as it did later to President Buchanan, that any one should ever have held a different view. If the Court with the force of its prestige should give legal sanction to the new doctrine, it would allay popular agitation, ensure the preservation of the Union, and secure to each section its legitimate rights. Such apparently was the expectation of the majority of the Court in rendering the decision. But the decision was not unanimous. Each judge presented an individual opinion. Five supported the Chief Justice on the main points as to the status of the African race and the validity of the Missouri Compromise. Judge Nelson registered a protest against the entrance of the Court into the political arena. Curtis and McLean wrote elaborate dissenting opinions. Not only did the decision have no tendency to allay party debate, but it added greatly to the acrimony of the discussion. Republicans accepted the dissenting opinions of Curtis and McLean as a complete refutation of the arguments of the Chief Justice; and the Court itself, through division among its members, became a partizan inst.i.tution. The arguments of the justices thus present a complete summary of the views of the proslavery and anti-slavery parties, and the opposing opinions stand as permanent evidence of the impossibility of reconciling slavery and freedom in the same government.

It was through the masterful leadership of Stephen A. Douglas that the Lecompton Const.i.tution was defeated. In 1858 an election was to be held in Illinois to determine whether or not Douglas should be reelected to the United States Senate. The Buchanan Administration was using its utmost influence to insure Douglas's defeat. Many eastern Republicans believed that in this emergency Illinois Republicans should support Douglas, or at least that they should do nothing to diminish his chances for reelection; but Illinois Republicans decided otherwise and nominated Abraham Lincoln as their candidate for the senatorship. Then followed the memorable Lincoln-Douglas debates.

This is not the place for any extended account of the famous duel between the rival leaders, but a few facts must be stated. Lincoln had slowly come to the perception that a large portion of the people abhorred slavery, and that the weak point in the armor of Douglas was to be found in the fact that he did not recognize this growing moral sense. Douglas had never been a defender of slavery on ethical grounds, nor had he expressed any distinct aversion to the system. In support of his policy of popular sovereignty his favorite dictum had been, "I do not care whether slavery is voted up or voted down."

This apparent moral obtuseness furnished to Lincoln his great opportunity, for his opponent was apparently without a conscience in respect to the great question of the day. Lincoln, on the contrary, had reached the conclusion not only that slavery was wrong, but that the relation between slavery and freedom was such that they could not be harmonized within the same government. In the debates he again put forth his famous utterance, "A house divided against itself cannot stand," with the explanation that in course of time either this country would become all slave territory or slavery would be restricted and placed in a position which would involve its final extinction. In other words, Lincoln's position was similar to that of the conservative abolitionists. As we know, Birney had given expression to a similar conviction of the impossibility of maintaining both liberty and slavery in this country, but Lincoln spoke at a time when the whole country had been aroused upon the great question; when it was still uncertain whether slavery would not be forced upon the people of Kansas; when the highest court in the land had rendered a decision which was apparently intended to legalize slavery in all Territories; and when the alarming question had been raised whether the next step would not be legalization in all the States.

Lincoln was a long-headed politician, as well as a man of sincere moral judgments. He was defining issues for the campaign of 1860 and was putting Douglas on record so that it would be impossible for him, as the candidate of his party, to become President. Douglas had many an uncomfortable hour as Lincoln exposed his vain efforts to reconcile his popular sovereignty doctrine with the Dred Scott decision. As Lincoln expected, Douglas won the senatorship, but he lost the greater prize.

The crusade against slavery was nearing its final stage. Under the leadership of such men as Sumner, Seward, and Lincoln, a political party was being formed whose policies were based upon the a.s.sumption that slavery is both a moral and a political evil. Even at this stage the party had a.s.sumed such proportions that it was likely to carry the ensuing presidential election. Davis and Yancey, the chief defenders of slavery, were at the same time reaching a definite conclusion as to what should follow the election of a Republican President. And that conclusion involved nothing less than the fate of the Union.

CHAPTER XIV. JOHN BROWN

The crusade against slavery was based upon the a.s.sumption that slavery, like war, is an abnormal state of society. As the tyrant produces the a.s.sa.s.sin, so on a larger scale slavery calls forth servile insurrection, or, as in the United States, an implacable struggle between free white persons and the defenders of slavery.

The propaganda of Southern and Western abolitionists had as a primary object the prevention of both servile insurrection and civil war. It was as clear to Southern abolitionists in the thirties as it was to Seward and Lincoln in the fifties that, unless the newly aroused slave power should be effectively checked, a terrible civil war would ensue. To forestall this dreaded calamity, they freely devoted their lives and fortunes. Peaceable emanc.i.p.ation by state action, according to the original program, was prevented by the rise of a sectional animosity which beclouded the issue. As the leadership drifted into the hands of extremists, the conservative ma.s.ses were confused, misled, or deceived. The South undoubtedly became the victim of the erroneous teachings of alarmists who believed that the anti-slavery North intended, by unlawful and unconst.i.tutional federal action, to abolish slavery in all the States; while the North had equally exaggerated notions as to the aggressive intentions of the South.

The opposing forces finally met on the plains of Kansas, and extreme Northern opposition became personified in John Brown of Osawatomie. He was born in Connecticut in May, 1800, of New England ancestry, the sixth generation from the Mayflower. A Calvinist, a mystic, a Bible-reading Puritan, he was trained to anti-slavery sentiments in the family of Owen Brown, his father. He pa.s.sed his early childhood in the Western Reserve of Ohio, and subsequently moved from Ohio to New York, to Pennsylvania, to Ohio again, to Connecticut, to Ma.s.sachusetts, and finally to New York once more. He was at various times tanner, farmer, sheep-raiser, horse-breeder, wool-merchant, and a follower of other callings as well. From a business standpoint he may be regarded as a failure, for he had been more than once a bankrupt and involved in much litigation. He was twice married and was the father of twenty children, eight of whom died in infancy.

Until the Kansas excitement nothing had occurred in the history of the Brown family to attract public attention. John Brown was not conspicuous in anti-slavery efforts or in any line of public reform. As a mere lad during the War of 1812 he accompanied his father, who was furnishing supplies to the army, and thus he saw much of soldiers and their officers. The result was that he acquired a feeling of disgust for everything military, and he consistently refused to perform the required military drill until he had pa.s.sed the age for service. Not quite in harmony with these facts is the statement that he was a great admirer of Oliver Cromwell, and Rhodes says of him that he admired Nat Turner, the leader of the servile insurrection in Virginia, as much as he did George Washington. There seems to be no reason to doubt the testimony of the members of his family that John Brown always cherished a lively interest in the African race and a deep sympathy with them. As a youth he had chosen for a companion a slave boy of his own age, to whom he became greatly attached. This slave, badly clad and poorly fed, beaten with iron shovel or anything that came first to hand, young Brown grew to regard as his equal if not his superior. And it was the contrast between their respective conditions that first led Brown to "swear eternal war with slavery." In later years John Brown, Junior, tells us that, on seeing a negro for the first time, he felt so great a sympathy for him that he wanted to take the negro home with him. This sympathy, he a.s.sures us, was a result of his father's teaching. Upon the testimony of two of John Brown's sons rests the oft-repeated story that he declared eternal war against slavery and also induced the members of his family to unite with him in formal consecration to his mission. The time given for this incident is previous to the year 1840; the idea that he was a divinely chosen agent for the deliverance of the slaves was of later development.

As early as 1834 Brown had shown some active interest in the education of negro children, first in Pennsylvania and later in Ohio. In 1848 the Brown family became a.s.sociated with an enterprise of Gerrit Smith in northern New York, where a hundred thousand acres of land were offered to negro families for settlement. During the excitement over the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 Brown organized among the colored people of Springfield, Ma.s.sachusetts, "The United States League of Gileadites." As an organization this undertaking proved a failure, but Brown's formal written instructions to the "Gileadites" are interesting on account of their relation to what subsequently happened. In this doc.u.ment, by referring to the mult.i.tudes who had suffered in their behalf, he encouraged the negroes to stand for their liberties. He instructed them to be armed and ready to rush to the rescue of any of their number who might be attacked:

"Should one of your number be arrested, you must collect together as quickly as possible, so as to outnumber your adversaries who are taking an active part against you. Let no able-bodied man appear on the ground unequipped, or with his weapons exposed to view: let that be understood beforehand. Your plans must be known only to yourself, and with the understanding that all traitors must die, wherever caught and proven to be guilty. Whosoever is fearful or afraid, let him return and depart early from Mount Gilead" (Judges, vii. 3; Deut. xx. 8). Give all cowards an opportunity to show it on condition of holding their peace. Do NOT DELAY ONE MOMENT AFTER YOU ARE READY: YOU WILL LOSE ALL YOUR RESOLUTION IF YOU DO. LET THE FIRST BLOW BE THE SIGNAL FOR ALL TO ENGAGE: AND WHEN ENGAGED DO NOT DO YOUR WORK BY HALVES, BUT MAKE CLEAN WORK WITH YOUR ENEMIES,-AND BE SURE YOU MEDDLE NOT WITH ANY OTHERS. By going about your business quietly, you will get the job disposed of before the number that an uproar would bring together can collect; and you will have the advantage of those who come out against you, for they will be wholly unprepared with either equipments or matured plans; all with them will be confusion and terror. Your enemies will be slow to attack you after you have done up the work nicely; and if they should, they will have to encounter your white friends as well as you; for you may safely calculate on a division of the whites, and may by that means get to an honorable parley."

He gives here a distinct suggestion of the plans and methods which he later developed and extended.

When Kansas was opened for settlement, John Brown was fifty-four years old. Early in the spring of 1855, five of his sons took up claims near Osawatomie. They went, as did others, as peaceable settlers without arms. After the election of March 30, 1855, at which armed Missourians overawed the Kansas settlers and thus secured a unanimous pro-slavery Legislature, the freestate men, under the leadership of Robinson, began to import Sharp's rifles and other weapons for defense. Brown's sons thereupon wrote to their father, describing their helpless condition and urging him to come to their relief. In October, 1855, John Brown himself arrived with an adequate supply of rifles and some broadswords and revolvers. The process of organization and drill thereupon began, and when the Wakarusa War occurred early in December, 1855, John Brown was on hand with a small company from Osawatomie to a.s.sist in the defense of Lawrence. The statement that he disapproved of the agreement with Governor Shannon which prevented bloodshed is not in accord with a letter which John Brown wrote to his wife immediately after the event. The Governor granted practically all that the freestate men desired and recognized their trainbands as a part of the police force of the Territory. Brown by this stipulation became Captain John Brown, commander of a company of the territorial militia.

Soon after the Battle of Wakarusa, Captain Brown pa.s.sed the command of the company of militia to his son John, while he became the leader of a small band composed chiefly of members of his own family. Writing to his wife on April 7, 1856, he said: "We hear that preparations are making in the United States Court for numerous arrests of free-state men. For one I have not desired (all things considered) to have the slave power cease from its acts of aggression. 'Their foot shall slide in due time.'" This letter of Brown's indicates that the writer was pleased at the prospect of approaching trouble.

When, six weeks later, notice came of the attack upon Lawrence, John Brown, Junior, went with the company of Osawatomie Rifles to the relief of the town, while the elder Brown with a little company of six moved in the same direction. In a letter to his wife, dated June 26, 1856, more than a month after the ma.s.sacre in Pottawatomie Valley, Brown said:

"On our way to Lawrence we learned that it had been already destroyed, and we encamped with John's company overnight.... On the second day and evening after we left John's men, we encountered quite a number of pro-slavery men and took quite a number of prisoners. Our prisoners we let go, but kept some four or five horses. We were immediately after this accused of murdering five men at Pottawatomie and great efforts have been made by the Missourians and their ruffian allies to capture us. John's company soon afterwards disbanded, and also the Osawatomie men. Since then, we have, like David of old, had our dwelling with the serpents of the rocks and the wild beasts of the wilderness."

There will probably never be agreement as to Brown's motives in slaying his five neighbors on May 24, 1856. Opinions likewise differ as to the effect which this incident had on the history of Kansas. Abolitionists of every cla.s.s had said much about war and about servile insurrection, but the conservative people of the West and South had mentioned the subject only by way of warning and that they might point out ways of prevention. Garrison and his followers had used language which gave rise to the impression that they favored violent revolution and were not averse to fomenting servile insurrection. They had no faith in the efforts of Northern emigrants to save Kansas from the clutches of the slaveholding South, and they denounced in severe terms the Robinson leadership there, believing it sure to result in failure. To this cla.s.s of abolitionists John Brown distinctly belonged. He believed that so high was the tension on the slavery question throughout the country that revolution, if inaugurated at any point, would sweep the land and liberate the slaves. Brown was also possessed of the belief that he was himself the divinely chosen agent to let loose the forces of freedom; and that this was the chief motive which prompted the deed at Pottawatomie is as probable as any other.

Viewed in this light, the Pottawatomie ma.s.sacre was measurably successful. Opposing forces became more clearly defined and were pitted against each other in hostile array. There were reprisals and counter-reprisals. Kansas was plunged into a state of civil war, but it is quite probable that this condition would have followed the looting of Lawrence even if John Brown had been absent from the Territory.