United States House election, 1854

United States House of Representatives elections, 1854

← 1852 August 4, 1854 - November 6, 1855 1856 →
All 234 seats to the United States House of Representatives 118 seats were needed for a majority
First party Second party Third party   Leader William Alexander Richardson Henry M. Fuller Nathaniel P. Banks Party Democratic Whig Know Nothing Leader's seat Illinois-5th Pennsylvania-12th Massachusetts-7th Last election 158 seats 71 seats 0 seats Seats won 83 54 51 Seat change 75 17 51   Fourth party Fifth party   Leader Lewis D. Campbell Schuyler Colfax Party Republican People's Leader's seat Ohio-3rd Indiana-9th Last election 4 seats 0 seats Seats won 37 9 Seat change 33 9
Speaker before election Linn Boyd Democratic Elected Speaker Nathaniel P. Banks American

Linn Boyd
Democratic

Nathaniel P. Banks
American

Elections to the United States House of Representatives for the 34th Congress were held at various dates in each State, the earliest being in the middle of President Franklin Pierce's term on August 4, 1854 (in Arkansas) and the latest on November 6, 1855 (in Louisiana and Maryland).

The Democratic and Whig parties, which had been the 2 largest parties for the past 20 years, both lost a substantial amount of seats. The Democrats in particular lost their majority in the chamber which they had held since 1850. The American Party (commonly called the Know Nothings) and the Opposition Party formed a coalition government which elected Nathaniel P. Banks as House Speaker even though the Democratic Party won the election with the largest plurality of seats. The Opposition Party included members of the Whig Party (which would soon collapse), the People's Party of Indiana, Anti-Nebraska candidates, and members of the nascent Republican Party.

The major issue of this midterm election was the recently passed Kansas-Nebraska Act and the Bleeding Kansas conflict that resulted from it. The Act infuriated much of the North, as it repealed the Missouri Compromise of 1820, and opened the Federal territories to slavery. Because the Pierce Administration and Democrats in Congress had been the primary supporters of the Act, the party lost many seats in the Northern states; this included 16 in New York, 12 in Ohio and 9 in Pennsylvania. The new Anti-Nebraska movement (a loose group of independent, Free Soil, and early Republican politicians) gained a combined 37 seats in the North. The American Party gained seats in both the North and South. It ignored the slavery issue and focused on pushing for reduced immigration, especially from Catholic areas of Ireland and Germany.

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