‘Our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honors’: The Kansas Civil War and the revolutionary tradition

Abstract

New England settlers used the history of the American Revolution in their struggle against the proslavery party in Kansas territory. As the settlement of Kansas became increasingly politicized over slavery, New England settlers drew on the history of their Puritan and Patriot ancestors to legitimize their actions. Although the New Englanders were a minority of the Kansas population, they nonetheless claimed a privileged understanding of the meaning of liberty in the United States. The free‐state political movement used these claims as an effective propaganda tool. The New England settlers, and the free‐state movement, claimed to be acting on the principles of the Revolution. At times, free‐staters argued that their struggle surpassed the Revolution in significance. Eventually, later Kansans concluded that the Kansas Civil War had been, not a revolution itself, but the prelude to a national Civil War of revolutionary significance in its spread of human liberty.