Page 340 - American Stories, A History of the United States

already acquired. Recognizing that the slavery question was the main obstacle to his
program, he sought to neutralize it through compromise and evasion (see Chapter 13.1
14). His failure to win the presidency or even the Democratic nomination before 1860
showed that Young America’s dream of a patriotic consensus for headlong expansion
and economic development could not withstand the tensions and divisions that expan- 13.2
sionist policies created and brought to light.

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