who were the leaders of the opposition republican party
Republican Party (United States) Founded in the Northern states in 1854 by anti-slavery activists, modernizers, ex Whigs and ex Free Soilers, the Republican Party quickly became the principal opposition to the dominant Democratic Party and the briefly popular Know Nothing Party. The main cause was opposition to the Kansas–Nebraska Act, which repealed the Missouri Compromise by which slavery was kept out of Kansas. The Northern Republicans saw the expansion of slavery as a great evil. The first public meeting of the general "anti-Nebraska" movement where the name "Republican" was suggested for a new anti-slavery party was held on March 20, 1854, in a schoolhouse in Ripon, Wisconsin.[22] The name was partly chosen to pay homage to Thomas Jefferson's Republican Party.[23]
History of the United States Democratic Party The Democratic Party is the oldest voter-based political party in the world and the oldest existing political party in the United States, tracing its heritage back to the anti-Federalists and the Jeffersonian Democratic-Republican Party of the 1790s.[1][2][3] During the Second Party System (from 1832 to the mid-1850s) under Presidents Andrew Jackson, Martin Van Buren and James K. Polk, the Democrats usually bested the opposition Whig Party by narrow margins. Both parties worked hard to build grassroots organizations and maximize the turnout of voters, which often reached 80 percent or 90 percent.[citation needed] Both parties used patronage extensively to finance their operations, which included emerging big city political machines as well as national networks of newspapers. The Democratic Party was a proponent for slave-owners across the country, urban workers and caucasian immigrants.