What if... Stephen Douglas wins the Democratic nomination in 1856?

[minionofmidas]

Ernest, you're presuming the Southern Democrats would have swallowed Douglas in 1856.
I don't believe that.

[minionofmidas]

Nah, Douglas was not gonna be anybody's tool, and nobody would have been fooled into believing it. The man's character was well known.
Kansas-Nebraska was not popular in the South, the way I remember it...I'd have to look it up though. And what's Dred Scott got to do with it?
EDIT - Last one's easy. The Freeport Doctrine. My bad for not thinking of it.
I didn't find an answer on the popularity of Kansas-Nebraska. The Wiki article is actually self-contradictory. It claims that the measure was supported (in Congress) by Southerners and Northern Democrats - a vast majority - , but also that passage required a lot of skillful wheeling and dealing.

[minionofmidas]

Kansas-Nebraska not only created a Kansas small enough potentially to become a slave state, it opened up the territory to slavery so that it could become a slave state.

Yes, but it didn't actually happen, and Douglas predicted it wouldn't actually happen.