The plans of the Southerners for the creation of the new State, were well matured, and seemed in every way feasible. The geographical situation was ideal. The close proximity of the friendly State of Missouri, with a large percentage of its population on its western border, backed by the mutuality of every Southern State, seemed to be sufficient guaranty that the necessary voting population could, and would, be promptly furnished. They had good cause to believe that they could get their people into the Territory in sufficient numbers to control the necessary elections. In the Senate Mr. Seward said, May 25, 1854: The sun has set for the last time upon the guaranteed and certain liberties of all the unsettled portions of the American continent that lie within the jurisdiction of the United States. Tomorrow's sun will rise in deep eclipse over these. How long that obscuration shall last, is known only to the power that directs all human events. For myself I know this: that no human power can prevent its coming on, and that its passage off will be hastened and secured by others than those now belonging to this generation.[76] Authorities by the score might be cited to show the gloom and despondency of the North at this time. The people had reason to believe that Kansas and Nebraska would become Slave States, and that the preponderance of Southern influence in governmental affairs would be perpetuated indefinitely. May 30, 1854, the Kansas-Nebraska Bill was signed and the doctrine of Squatter Sovereignty thereby crystallized into law. Immediately the historic contest for the occupation and political control of Kansas Territory was on: a contest that marks an epoch in the history of our country. The great events of the succeeding decade: the acts of secession, the war between the States, with its tragedies; and the Emancipation Proclamation, were all involved in the result. It cannot be said that the contest was of local concern, carried on between factions in Kansas over the question whether the State should be a Free State or a Slave State; for at that time there were no settlers in the Territory to comprise such factions. The interest in the impending struggle was nation wide. Congress had merely cleared the ground for action; "pitched the ring," for what was to be the first political battle in the "fight to a finish" between the slave-holding and the non-slave-holding sections of our country: the beginning of the final struggle between freedom and slavery. The question of slavery in the Territory was to be decided by the votes of the people who would emigrate to and occupy it. The South had chosen to place its reliance upon votes in a contest where oratory, tact, and statesmanship had theretofore failed. Its slogan was "Squatter Sovereignty." The answer given back by the North was "Organized Emigration:" "a power unknown before in the world's history."