The secret organizations, of which Greeley spoke, known as the “Blue Lodges,” “Social Bands,” and “Sons of the South,” became very active, and knowing the condition of affairs along the Missouri border, and having learned the needs and wishes of the actual settlers in the territory, Governor Reeder decided that their rights should not be jeopardized. Therefore, in ordering an election of a congressional delegate only, with the idea of a later proclamation ordering a territorial election of a legislature, he knew that much trouble would be spared. In his proclamation for the congressional election, provision was made for defining the qualifications of legal voters, and providing against fraud, both of which provisions were received with alarm by the leaders of the slavery Democracy, who, up to that time had hoped that the administration at Washington had sent them an ally. It was not long until they discovered that they were mistaken. The actual settlers of the territory did not evince much interest in the election. They were all engaged in what appeared to them to be the more important business of building their homes and otherwise providing necessities before the approach of winter. There were no party organizations in the territory. The slavery question was not generally understood to be an issue. The first candidates to announce themselves were James N. Burnes, whose name has for sixty years been prominently identified with the social, political and business history of Atchison county, and J. B. Chapman. These two candidates subsequently withdrew from the campaign, and the names finally submitted to the voters were: Gen. John W. Whitfield, Robert P. Flenneken, Judge John A. Wakefield. Whitfield ignored the slavery issue during his canvass, but his cause was openly espoused by the Missourians. Flenneken was a friend of Governor Reeder, with Free Soil proclivities. Wakefield was an outspoken Free-Soiler. Hon. David R. Atchison, then a United States senator, and for whom Atchison county was named, was the head and front of the pro- slavery movement. He had a national reputation and was a power in the United States Senate, and won for himself the highest position in the gift of the Senate, having been chosen president protempore of that body after the death of Vice-President King. He was loyal to the southern views regarding slavery and this made him the unquestioned leader of the party which believed, as Senator Atchison himself believed, that the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska bill would inevitably result in a slave State west of Missouri. It was to Senator Atchison that Dr. J. H. Stringfellow, himself one of the strong leaders of the pro-slavery forces, looked for inspiration and direction. In a speech Senator Atchison made in Weston, Mo., November 6, 1854, which was just prior to the congressional election in Kansas, he said: