Definition of Kansas-Nebraska Bill

What does the word Kansas-Nebraska Bill mean?

• part of speech: noun

  Under the provisions of this bill, which was passed by Congress May 22, 1854, Kansas and Nebraska were separated and organized into Territories. The importance of this bill lay in the fact that it practically repealed the Missouri Compromise. In the bill as reported by Stephen A. Douglas, the question of slavery in the two Territories was to be settled within the Territories, and if adopted the fugitive slave law was to apply. The status of Nebraska was easily settled as a free Territory, but the question caused much trouble in Kansas. The passage of the act had much to do with bringing on the Civil War.