“I considered it at once as the knell of the Union. It is hushed indeed for the moment… but this is a reprieve only, not a final sentence. A geographical line, coinciding with a marked principle, moral and political, once conceived and held up to the angry passions of men, will never be obliterated; and every new irritation will mark it deeper and deeper.”
– Thomas Jefferson, letter to John Holmes, Senator from Maine, 1820
The Founding Father who provided the quote above, still alive as sectionalism began to savage the country, was most likely responding to the _________ when he made his statement.
The Mexican Cession
Kansas-Nebraska Act
Missouri Compromise
Compromise of 1850