Massachusetts Emigrant Aid Company
Encyclopedia
Immigration
Immigration is the act of foreigners passing or coming into a country for the purpose of permanent residence...
to the Kansas Territory
Kansas Territory
The Territory of Kansas was an organized incorporated territory of the United States that existed from May 30, 1854, until January 29, 1861, when the eastern portion of the territory was admitted to the Union as the State of Kansas....
to shift the balance of power so that Kansas would enter the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
as a free state rather than a slave state
Slave state
In the United States of America prior to the American Civil War, a slave state was a U.S. state in which slavery was legal, whereas a free state was one in which slavery was either prohibited from its entry into the Union or eliminated over time...
. Created by Eli Thayer
Eli Thayer
Eli Thayer was a member of the United States House of Representatives from 1857 to 1861. Thayer was born in Mendon, Massachusetts. He graduated from Worcester Academy in 1840, from Brown University in 1845, and in 1848 founded Oread Institute, a school for young women in Worcester, Massachusetts...
in the wake of the Kansas-Nebraska Act
Kansas-Nebraska Act
The Kansas–Nebraska Act of 1854 created the territories of Kansas and Nebraska, opening new lands for settlement, and had the effect of repealing the Missouri Compromise of 1820 by allowing settlers in those territories to determine through Popular Sovereignty if they would allow slavery within...
, which allowed the population of Kansas Territory to choose whether slavery would be legal, the Company is noted less for its direct impact than for the psychological impact it had on proslavery and antislavery
Abolitionism
Abolitionism is a movement to end slavery.In western Europe and the Americas abolitionism was a movement to end the slave trade and set slaves free. At the behest of Dominican priest Bartolomé de las Casas who was shocked at the treatment of natives in the New World, Spain enacted the first...
elements. Thayer's prediction that the Company would eventually be able to send 20,000 immigrants a year never came to fruition, but it spurred Border Ruffians from nearby Missouri
Missouri
Missouri is a US state located in the Midwestern United States, bordered by Iowa, Illinois, Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Kansas and Nebraska. With a 2010 population of 5,988,927, Missouri is the 18th most populous state in the nation and the fifth most populous in the Midwest. It...
, where slavery was legal, to move to Kansas in order to ensure its admission to the Union as a slave state. This in turn further galvanized Free-Staters and enemies of "The Slave Power".
Thayer's intention was to capitalize on antislavery sentiment in the Northern United States
Northern United States
Northern United States, also sometimes the North, may refer to:* A particular grouping of states or regions of the United States of America. The United States Census Bureau divides some of the northernmost United States into the Midwest Region and the Northeast Region...
and send settlers to Kansas to purchase land and build houses, shops and mills. They could then sell the land at a significant profit and send the proceeds back to Thayer and his investors. At the behest of several investors who found the notion of profiting from the antislavery cause distasteful, the Company's model was shifted to that of a benevolent society and it was rechristened the New England Emigrant Aid Company in 1855. While the Company achieved neither a profit nor a significant impact on the population of Kansas, it played an important role in the events that would later be termed Bleeding Kansas
Bleeding Kansas
Bleeding Kansas, Bloody Kansas or the Border War, was a series of violent events, involving anti-slavery Free-Staters and pro-slavery "Border Ruffian" elements, that took place in the Kansas Territory and the western frontier towns of the U.S. state of Missouri roughly between 1854 and 1858...
.
Creation
The Company was formed in the midst of the sectional crisis that preceded the American Civil WarAmerican Civil War
The American Civil War was a civil war fought in the United States of America. In response to the election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States, 11 southern slave states declared their secession from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America ; the other 25...
. To the Northern United States
Northern United States
Northern United States, also sometimes the North, may refer to:* A particular grouping of states or regions of the United States of America. The United States Census Bureau divides some of the northernmost United States into the Midwest Region and the Northeast Region...
, the concept of popular sovereignty
Popular sovereignty in the United States
The American Revolution marked a departure in the concept of popular sovereignty as it had been discussed and employed in the European historical context. With their Revolution, Americans substituted the sovereignty in the person of the English king, George III, with a collective sovereign—composed...
, which stated that the population of each new U.S. state
U.S. state
A U.S. state is any one of the 50 federated states of the United States of America that share sovereignty with the federal government. Because of this shared sovereignty, an American is a citizen both of the federal entity and of his or her state of domicile. Four states use the official title of...
should be allowed to decide whether it was a free or slave state
Slave state
In the United States of America prior to the American Civil War, a slave state was a U.S. state in which slavery was legal, whereas a free state was one in which slavery was either prohibited from its entry into the Union or eliminated over time...
, was seen as an attempt by Southerners to gain power. When the Kansas-Nebraska Act
Kansas-Nebraska Act
The Kansas–Nebraska Act of 1854 created the territories of Kansas and Nebraska, opening new lands for settlement, and had the effect of repealing the Missouri Compromise of 1820 by allowing settlers in those territories to determine through Popular Sovereignty if they would allow slavery within...
threatened to extend popular sovereignty into the newly created Kansas Territory
Kansas Territory
The Territory of Kansas was an organized incorporated territory of the United States that existed from May 30, 1854, until January 29, 1861, when the eastern portion of the territory was admitted to the Union as the State of Kansas....
, Eli Thayer, a second-term Congressman from Massachusetts, hatched the idea of an Emigrant Aid Company in the winter of 1853-4. His primary partners in the venture were Alexander H. Bullock
Alexander H. Bullock
Alexander Hamilton Bullock was the 26th Governor of Massachusetts from 1866 to 1869 and helped create the New England Emigrant Aid Society in 1855.-Education and early career:...
and Edward Everett Hale
Edward Everett Hale
Edward Everett Hale was an American author, historian and Unitarian clergyman. He was a child prodigy who exhibited extraordinary literary skills and at age thirteen was enrolled at Harvard University where he graduated second in his class...
, and together they set Thayer's plans in motion on March 5, 1854. Thayer announced the Company at a rally against the impending passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act in Worcester
Worcester, Massachusetts
Worcester is a city and the county seat of Worcester County, Massachusetts, United States. Named after Worcester, England, as of the 2010 Census the city's population is 181,045, making it the second largest city in New England after Boston....
on March 11. Shortly thereafter, the Company's charter was approved by the Massachusetts Legislature for up to $5,000,000 in capital.
Officially, the Company was a profit-making venture, and how the settlers voted was of no consequence to the company. For example, the company secretary, Thomas Webb released a pamphlet in 1855 stating that although the settlers sent to the territories would not be required to vote for one side or the other, but they were expected to support the free-state movement. A number of abolitionists questioned the profit motive behind the company, and even many of Thayer's potential investors balked at the notion "that people might say we were influenced by pecuniary considerations in our patriotic work". Although Thayer personally disagreed with such hesitations, in 1855, the Company reorganized as a benevolent society and changed its named to the New England Emigrant Aid Company.
Reaction and impact
The success of the endeavor prompted other aid assistance companies to form back East, in New YorkNew York
New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
or Ohio
Ohio
Ohio is a Midwestern state in the United States. The 34th largest state by area in the U.S.,it is the 7th‑most populous with over 11.5 million residents, containing several major American cities and seven metropolitan areas with populations of 500,000 or more.The state's capital is Columbus...
, with new companies such as the Worchester Country Emigrant Aid Society.
The company was directly responsible for creating the Kansas
Kansas
Kansas is a US state located in the Midwestern United States. It is named after the Kansas River which flows through it, which in turn was named after the Kansa Native American tribe, which inhabited the area. The tribe's name is often said to mean "people of the wind" or "people of the south...
towns of Lawrence
Lawrence, Kansas
Lawrence is the sixth largest city in the U.S. State of Kansas and the county seat of Douglas County. Located in northeastern Kansas, Lawrence is the anchor city of the Lawrence, Kansas, Metropolitan Statistical Area, which encompasses all of Douglas County...
and Manhattan
Manhattan, Kansas
Manhattan is a city located in the northeastern part of the state of Kansas in the United States, at the junction of the Kansas River and Big Blue River. It is the county seat of Riley County and the city extends into Pottawatomie County. As of the 2010 census, the city population was 52,281...
, and it played a key role in founding Topeka
Topeka, Kansas
Topeka |Kansa]]: Tó Pee Kuh) is the capital city of the U.S. state of Kansas and the county seat of Shawnee County. It is situated along the Kansas River in the central part of Shawnee County, located in northeast Kansas, in the Central United States. As of the 2010 census, the city population was...
and Osawatomie
Osawatomie, Kansas
Osawatomie is a city in Miami County, Kansas, United States, southwest of Kansas City. As of the 2010 census, the city population was 4,447. It derives its name from two streams nearby, the Osage and Potawatomie.-History:...
. Lawrence was named after the Company secretary, Amos Lawrence
Amos Adams Lawrence
Amos Adams Lawrence , the son of famed philanthropist Amos Lawrence, was a key figure in the United States abolition movement in the years leading up to the Civil War, and instrumental in the establishment of the University of Kansas and Lawrence University in Appleton,...
. Multiple politicians were found in the emigrants who left for Kansas, such as Daniel Read Anthony
Daniel Read Anthony
Daniel Read Anthony was an American publisher and abolitionist. Considered colorful and controversial, he published the Leavenworth Times in Leavenworth, Kansas, as well as other newspapers in the area....
, Charles L. Robinson
Charles L. Robinson
Charles Lawrence Robinson was the first Governor of Kansas. He was also the first governor of a US state to be impeached, although he was not convicted or removed from office. To date he is the only governor of Kansas to be impeached...
, Samuel C. Pomeroy
Samuel C. Pomeroy
Samuel Clarke Pomeroy was an American Republican Senator from Kansas in the mid-19th century, serving in the United States Senate during the American Civil War. Pomeroy served in the Massachusetts House of Representatives...
, and Martin F. Conway
Martin F. Conway
Martin Franklin Conway was a U.S. congressman, consul to France, abolitionist, and advocate of the Free-State movement in Kansas....
, who would later be Kansas' first U.S. Representative.
The exact number of people who left for Kansas is unknown. James Rawley puts the numbers somewhere around 2000, of whom about a third returned home, while The Kansas Historical Society
Kansas Historical Society
The Kansas Historical Society is the official state historical society of Kansas.Headquartered in Topeka, it operates as "the trustee of the state" for the purpose of maintaining the state's history and operates the Kansas Museum of History, Kansas State Archives and Library, Kansas State Capitol...
puts the number around 900 who left for Kansas in 1855 alone.