During the period of 1775 to 1860, many significant activities of Virginians took place at both the state and federal levels of government: the "Leopard-Chesapeake" Affair, Jeffersonian Democracy, John Marshall's role as Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court, the consent of Virginia allowing Kentucky County to become an independent state in the Union, the Lewis and Clark Expedition to the Northwest, the role of Norfolk, Hampton and Falls Church during the War of 1812, the Monroe Doctrine, the efforts of Henry Clay ("The Great Compromiser"), the historical connotation of the capital city, Monrovia, in Liberia, the creation of a non-sectarian state university and of the first state military school in the country, the attitude of Virginians toward the sectional issues of tariff, secession and slavery, the inventions of the McCormick Virginia Reaper and the Willcox-Gibbs Sewing Machine and the active participation of Virginians in the Texan Revolt and the Mexican War. John Brown's Raid at Harper's Ferry increased sectionalism and intensified the slavery problem. By 1860, the population of Virginia had reached over one and one-half million people, including approximately 500,000 slaves. 4 Historical Life: 1860-Present _The War Between the States_ In November 1860, Abraham Lincoln was elected President of the United States. He represented the Republican Party which strongly opposed slavery, and he had made numerous speeches stating his personal opposition to it. Although Lincoln had declared that he had no desire to interfere with slavery in the states where it already existed, he also had made the following statement: "A house divided against itself cannot stand. I believe this government cannot endure permanently half slave and half free. I do not expect the Union to be dissolved: I do not expect the house to fall; but I do expect that it will cease to be divided. It will become all one thing or all the other." Thus, on December 20, it was not a complete surprise that a special convention held at Charleston, South Carolina, resulted in the secession of South Carolina, a strong pro-slavery state, from the Union. By February 1861, six other southern states had acted likewise. The Confederate States of America was organized at Montgomery, Alabama, with Jefferson Davis as its President.