States' rights was an ideology applied as a means of advancing slave state interests through federal authority. Thomas Krannawitter notes the "Southern demand for federal slave protection represented a demand for an unprecedented expansion of Federal power." Before the war, slavery advocates supported use of federal powers to enforce and extend slavery, as with the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 and the
Dred Scott v. Sandford decision. The faction that pushed for secession often infringed on states' rights. Because of the overrepresentation of pro-slavery factions in the federal government, many Northerners, even non-abolitionists, feared the
Slave Power conspiracy.
