Identifier: iowajournalofhis1913stat (find matches)
Title: The Iowa journal of history and politics
Year: 1903 (1900s)
Authors: State Historical Society of Iowa
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Publisher: Iowa City : State Historical Society of Iowa
Contributing Library: Allen County Public Library Genealogy Center
Digitizing Sponsor: Internet Archive

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r the reason that the inhabitantsof the First District outnumbered those of the Second Dis-trict by several thousand, as shown by the census returns of1847, 1848, and 1849.^ Nor could the transfer have beenmade for political reasons. The election returns do, indeed,indicate a decreasing Democratic majority in the First Dis-trict and an increasing Democratic majority in the SecondDistrict. But the small Whig majority of five in PoweshiekCounty in the election of 1848* was not sufficient to makeany material difference in the political strength of the twodistricts. The chief merit of the law seems to have beenthat it tended to straighten the dividing line and so makethe form of the districts more regular.^ (See Map.) 2 Laws of Iowa, Extra Session, 1848, pp. 34, 35. 3 Hulls Historical and Comparative Census, pp. 196, 198. 4 Election returns as found in the Archives in Des Moines. sPeirces Congressional Districting in Iowa in The Iowa Journal of His-tory AND Politics, Vol. I, pp. 337, 338.
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CONGRESSIONAL ELECTIONS IN IOWA 41 The war with Mexico was concluded by the treaty ofGuadaloupe Hidalgo on February 2, 1848. By this treatythe vast area of New Mexico and California was ceded tothe United States. This large addition of more than 500,000square miles of territory immediately brought into com-manding importance the question of slavery extension.Political parties and party leaders did not, indeed, announcethemselves as advocates or opponents of the extension ofslavery until the crisis was at hand; but every great meas-ure, beginning with the annexation of Texas in 1845,was considered and decided with reference chiefly to theextension, the maintenance, or the overthrow of the in-stitution of slavery. The opponents of slavery becamebolder and more aggressive; its defenders more vigilant,more resentful of attacks upon it, more rigid in their ostra-cism of public men at the North who did not accept theirprinciples, more resolute in the event of a denial of their rights in the

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