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• Under the command of Stephen Kearny, U.S. forces advanced west. He led about 1,500 men from Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, across the desert to Santa Fe, NM.
• The Mexican governor fled, allowing the Americans to capture New Mexico's capital, Santa Fe, on August 18, 1846, without firing a shot. Kearny and his army then headed across the deserts of New Mexico and Arizona to California. 1858, Stephen Douglas and Lincoln were campaigning against each other for Senate seat
During the debates, Douglas still advocated "popular sovereignty," which maintained the right of the citizens of a territory to permit or prohibit slavery. It was, he said, a sacred right of self-government.
Lincoln pointed out that Douglas's position directly challenged the Dred Scott decision, which decreed that the citizens of a territory had no such power.
FREEPORT DOCTRINE, Douglas replied that whatever the Supreme Court decided was not as important as the actions of the citizens. If a territory refused to have slavery, no laws, no Supreme Court ruling, would force them to permit it.
This sentiment would be taken as betrayal to many southern Democrats and would come back to haunt Douglas in his bid to become President in the election of 1860. ;
