ABSTRACT
The boundless lands of the West seemed to be a solution to the nation's most pressing economic and political problems. For many white Southerners, the new lands provided a means to expand cotton planting and slaveholding. The new territory did not prove to be the immediate panacea that Thomas Jefferson and others had foreseen. Although the newly acquired Western lands provided independence and prosperity for some, they also became the nation's battleground over slavery and its expansion. When the admission of Missouri came to the floor of the House of Representatives in 1819, the battle over slavery reared its ugly head. Slavery was well entrenched in the territory, existing in the region long before the Louisiana Purchase ended decades of Spanish and French rule. The Missouri Compromise stated that Missouri would be admitted as a slave state, while Maine would enter as a free state.
