Disagreements between slave states and free states were the main cause of disunion and the war. Slavery had been controversial during the framing of the Constitution in 1787, which, because of compromises, ended up with proslavery and antislavery features. The issue had confounded the nation since its inception and increasingly separated the US into a slaveholding South and a free North. The issue was exacerbated by the country's rapid territorial expansion, which repeatedly brought the question of whether new territory should be slaveholding or free. The issue had dominated politics for decades. Attempts to resolve the matter included the Missouri Compromise and Compromise of 1850, but these only postponed the showdown over slavery that would lead to the war.