Kansas is the state that helped to bring on the Civil War, due to bloodshed in that territory after the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act in 1854, allowing the possibility of the expansion of slavery into that Great Plains state.
Kansas was one of the centers of the Prohibition Movement, which led to the 18th Amendment and the Volstead Act, outlawing the manufacture and sale of intoxicating beverages in 1919, although Prohibition was ended by the 21st Amendment in 1933.
Kansas was the center of the segregation battles, as the only truly non Southern state to allow segregation of the races, becoming the center of attention in the Brown V. Board of Education Of Topeka, Kansas case in 1954, outlawing school segregation nationally.
Kansas was also the state of some of the major anti abortion battles, the murder of an abortion provider, Dr George Tiller, and the present attempt to prevent all abortions in the state, contestable in the federal courts right now.
And now, Kansas is the center of the greatest experiment of all in the promotion of the Tea Party Movement, with former Senator Sam Brownback now the new Governor of Kansas, and determined to promote its basic principles.
The goal of Brownback is to cut expenditures for education; take action against the Obama Health Care legislation; promote massive cuts in social service agencies and the arts; reduce the number of laws and regulations and state agencies; cut the number of state workers; and take advantage of the biggest Republican dominance in the state in a half century by working to eliminate even moderates in the party who oppose such drastic change.
Brownback is promoting the virtues of limited government, but his critics accuse him of “slash and burn” tactics, and a level of arrogance tied to his devout religious beliefs. The influence and support of the Koch Brothers, Charles and David, is clearcut in Kansas.
The critics believe Kansas will be damaged long term by what Brownback is doing, and that his hope of promoting economic growth in a state that has not seen for decades any major population surge will fail to be achieved.
Meanwhile, Kansas will continue to be at the center of some of the major controversies in the nation, as it has been since its beginning!