s a result of the Mexican War. This compromise allowed abolition of the slave trade in the District of Columbia and admission of California as a free state. Another part of the compromise was the Fugitive Slave Law of 1850, which provided for the return of runaway slaves to their masters. But many free states in the Union passed personal liberty laws in an effort to help the slaves escape. Many Northerners set up underground railroads where the runaway slaves could hide and get food and be directed to Canada for freedom. This angered many Southerners. This compromise also said that the territory east of California given to the United States by Mexico was divided into the territories of New Mexico and Utah, and they were opened to settlement by both slaveholders and antislavery settlers. This measure outdated the Missouri Compromise of 1820. All these compromise measures resulted in a gradual intensification of the hostility between the slave and free states. Again another law was passed in 1854. It was called the Kansas-Nebraska Act. It authorized the creation of Kansas and Nebraska. It repealed the Missouri Compromise of 1820 that had prohibited slavery in the territories north of 36 30', and stated that the inhabitants of the territories should decide for themselves the legality of slaveholding. The removal of the restriction on the expansion of slavery ensured southern support for the bill, which was signed into law by President Franklin Pierce on May 30, 1854. A conflict developed in Kansas between proslavery settlers from Missouri and antislavery newcomers who began to move into the territory from the northeastern states. This was what known as "Bleeding Kansas." There were also many people in the North known as abolitionists who made the South look very bad. The abolitionists played a major role in shaping the views of many Northerners. These people were fully against slavery and its expansion and most of the time took matters int...
