Douglas supported the Dred Scott Supreme Court decision of 1857, and denied that it was part of a Southern plot to introduce slavery in the Northern states; but also argued it could not be effective when the people of a territory declined to pass laws supporting it. when President James Buchanan and his Southern allies attempted to pass a Federal slave code, to support slavery even against the wishes of the people of Kansas, he battled and defeated this movement as undemocratic. this caused the split in the Democratic Party in 1860, as Douglas won the nomination but a breakaway southern faction nominated their own candidate, Vice President John C. Breckinridge. Douglas deeply believed in democracy, arguing the will of the people should always be decisive. when civil war came in April 1861, he rallied his supporters to the Union with all his energies, but he died a few weeks later.
