Prior to the organization of the Kansas – Nebraska territory in 1854 , the Kansas and Nebraska Territories were consolidated as part of the Indian Territory . Throughout the 1830s , large-scale relocations of Native American tribes to the Indian Territory took place , with many Southeastern nations removed to present-day Oklahoma , a process ordered by the Indian Removal Act of 1830 and known as the Trail of Tears , and many Midwestern nations removed by way of treaty to present-day Kansas . Among the latter were the Shawnee , Delaware , Kickapoo , Kaskaskia and Peoria , Ioway , and Miami . The passing of the Kansas – Nebraska Act came into direct conflict with the relocations . White American settlers from both the free-soil North and pro-slavery South flooded the Northern Indian Territory , hoping to influence the vote on slavery that would come following the admittance of Kansas and , to a lesser extent , Nebraska to the United States
Trail of Tears
Trail of Tears
Kansas–Nebraska Act