"The presidential campaign of 1848 saw the first strong electoral challenge to the expansion of slavery in the United States; most historians consider the appearance of the Free Soil Party in that election a major turning point of the nineteenth century. The three-way race capped a decade of political turmoil that had raised the issue of slavery to unprecedented prominence on the national stage and brought about critical splits in the two major parties."...

An account of a crucial turning point in American history along the road to the Civil War reveals how partisan differences were transformed into a North-v.-South antagonism that caused the momentum toward the Civil War to go into high gear.