Prelude: an inheritance of slavery -- The nation's conflict over slavery in miniature: Illinois, 1818-1824 -- Democrats, Whigs, and party conflict, 1825-1842 -- Manifest Destiny, slavery, and the rupture of the Democratic Party, 1843-1847 -- Advocates for an antislavery nation, 1837-1848 -- Stephen A. Douglas and the northern democratic origins of the Kansas-Nebraska Act, 1849-1854 -- The collapse of the Douglas democracy, 1854-1860 -- Abraham Lincoln and the triumph of an antislavery nationalism, 1854-1860 -- Conclusion: the northern Democrats' dilemma over slavery.
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