o the South, was found
in Franklin Pierce, who had fought in the war with Mexico. Against him
the Whigs pitted the commander-in-chief in the war. But Scott was
thought to be tainted with free-soil opinions. The Democrats, more
thoroughly united, swept the country, and the new administration came
into power with a great majority in both houses of Congress.

In neither branch of that Democratic Congress was there another man so
fit to take the lead as Douglas. A new senator, coming to Washington in
1852, found him already risen to the first importance there. "His power
as a debater," said this observer, "seemed to me unequaled in the
Senate. He was industrious, energetic, bold, and skillful in the
management of the affairs of his party. He was the acknowledged leader
of the Democratic party in the Senate." It should be added that he never
lost touch with the lower House. Neither was he unmindful of the
President's part in making laws, but no President could be less disposed
than Pierce was to set up his will against any measure which might come
to him stamped with the party stamp. Douglas's wife died early in 1853,
and in the summer he made his journey to Europe. When he returned, he
was in a position the most favorable for original and constructive
statesmanship. By virtue of his leadership of the Senate, he was in
effect the leader of Congress. He had the power of initiative. He was at
the age when men are ripest for enterprises of pith and moment.
Unhesitatingly, he advanced to the front and centre of the stage. When
the session ended, his name was forever associated with a law that upset
precedents and traditions, divided old parties and summoned up new ones,
made--and unmade--history.

January 4, 1854, Mr. Douglas, from the Committee on Territories,
reported a bill to form the Territory of Nebraska out of that part of
the Louisiana Purchase which lay west and north of Missouri.

CHAPTER IV

LEADERSHIP

There was nothing new in the main proposal. A bill to organize this same
Territory had passed the House the year before. It was generally
conceded that the region ought to have a territorial government. Vast as
it was, it had less than a thousand white inhabitants, but the overland
route to the Pacific ran across it, and there was sure to be a rapid
immigration into it so soon as it should be thrown open to settlers.
What was both new and startling was a clause permitting the inhabitants
of the Territory,