admission of not more than four States besides
Texas, out of the territory acquired. If these States should be formed
south of the Missouri Compromise line, they were to be admitted with
or without slavery, as the people of each should determine. Northern
men demurred, but Douglas saved the situation by offering as an
amendment, "And in such States as shall be formed north of said
Missouri Compromise line, slavery or involuntary servitude, except for
crime, shall be prohibited."[195] The amendment was accepted, and thus
amended, the joint resolution passed by an ample margin of votes. In
view of later developments, this extension of the Missouri Compromise
line is a point of great significance in the career of Douglas.

Not long after Douglas had voiced his vision of "an ocean-bound
republic," he was called upon to assist one of the most remarkable
emigrations westward, from his own State. The Mormons in Hancock
County had become the most undesirable of neighbors to his
constituents. Once the allies of the Democrats, they were now held in
detestation by all Gentiles of adjoining counties, irrespective of
political affiliations. The announcement of the doctrine of polygamy
by the Prophet Smith had been accompanied by acts of defiance and
followed by depredations, which, while not altogether unprovoked,
aroused the non-Mormons to a dangerous pitch of excitement. In the
midst of general disorder in Hancock County, Joseph Smith was
murdered. Every deed of violence was now attributed to the Danites, as
the members of the militant order of the Mormon Church styled
themselves. Early in the year 1845, the Nauvoo Charter was repealed;
and Governor Ford warned his quondam friends confidentially that they
had better betake themselves westward, suggesting California as "a
field for the prettiest enterprise that has been undertaken in modern
times." Disgraceful outrages filled the summer months of 1845 in
Hancock County. A band of Mormon-haters ravaged the county, burning
houses, barns, and grain stacks, and driving unprotected Mormon
settlers into Nauvoo. To put an end to this state of affairs, Governor
Ford sent Judge Douglas and Attorney-General McDougal, with a force of
militia under the command of General Hardin, into Hancock County.
Public meetings in all the adjoining counties were now demanding the
expulsion of the Mormons in menacing language.[196] While General
Hardin issued a proclamation bidding Mormons and anti-Mormons