As a result of the Mexican-American War, the United States acquired territories including California and New Mexico. This expansion intensified national debates over what issue in those lands?

• A. Slavery in new territories
• B. Tax policy
• C. Immigration
• D. Education funding

Answer: (A)

After winning new lands from Mexico, the big question became whether slavery would be legal in those territories. This mattered because allowing or banning slavery there would tilt political power in Congress and shape the economy and social system of the expanding nation. The North and South clashed over this, with abolitionists and free-soil advocates pushing to keep new lands free, and pro-slavery interests wanting to extend slavery into them. Debates and proposals, like attempts to ban slavery in the territories, signaled a growing sectional divide that would drive later battles over policy and statehood. This struggle over whether slavery would spread to California and New Mexico helps explain why the issue dominated national politics in the years following the war.