The serious sectional troubles in the United States began after the Louisiana Purchase. This great track of land became a magnet for trouble ever since it was bought. From Aaron Burr, the Trail of Tears, the Missouri Compromise, to Bleeding Kansas, the Plains Wars, its acquisition also helped sparke the Texas secession from Mexico, Annexation of Texas, and the War with Mexico, allowing the United States to acquire even territory and even more sectional troubles. Both Northern and Southern States governments were to blame for political and economic agitations for the control of these lands. The effects were to lead to conflicts and squables between North and South over the War of 1812, and admission of States, State Nullification and Slavery that would see the popular use of compromise or the threat of disunion.
"We have seen an attempt to form a Northern Confederacy, "to counteract and awe" the national government. We have seen and now see attempts to create "jealousies and heart burnings" between the "Northern and Southern, Atlantic and Western" States. And we have recently heard a declaration of a federalist, from Massachusetts, on the floor of Congress, that in case the bill to incorporate the Territory of New Orleans into the Union should pass, the Union would be virtually dissolved, and that it would be the duty of some States "to prepare definitely for a separation, amicably if they can, violently if they must." We are therefore convinced that the period of their attachment to the Union is past, and that it expired when they had lost all hope of being able to subject the States to their domination. Having therefore nothing to hope form the Union, they have surveyed the boundaries and marked out the limits of division, and look forward to the Empire of the North as the reward of their ambition..." James De Wolf, U.S. Senator from Rhode Island, Slave Trader, February 28, 1811.
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David Upton