FIRST -- Kansan U.S. Vice President - Topeka, KS
Posted by: 
bluesnote
N 39° 02.810 W 095° 40.794
15S E 268077 N 4325391
An official Kansas State marker located near the state capitol building.
Waymark Code: WMPABG
Location: Kansas, United States
Date Posted: 07/28/2015
Views: 2
The marker says, "Before it became the Kansas capital, Topeka was the seat of a free-state government-an alternative to the official proslavery territorial legislature elected in 1855. These two bodies represented opposing factions in Kansas' battle over slavery. Antislavery Kansans refused to recognize the official legislature because the elections has been heavily tainted by fraud: thousands of residents from proslavery Missouri crossed the border to cast illegal ballots in Kansas. The antislavery faction elected its own delegates in 1855 to draw up a state constitution. Lest the situation devolve into all-out civl war, President Franklin Pierce ordered federal troops to march into Topeka in July 1856 and shut down the free-state government. But the city remained a hotbed of anti-slavery agitation. When Kansas finally gained admission to the Union in 1861 - as a free state- Topeka became the lawful capital.
Topeka was also the birthplace of U.S. Vice President Charles Curtis (b.1860). Curtis was the first American Indian and the first Kansas to hold the office."
FIRST - Classification Variable: Person or Group
Date of FIRST: Not listed
More Information - Web URL: Not listed
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