The increased activity of the Underground Railroad in the 1850s suggests that southern states were becoming more lenient toward runaways. fewer enslaved people were running away. there was growing willingness in the North to aid fugitives seeking freedom.

its main object was the establishment of "settlement houses" in poor urban areas, in which volunteer middle-class "settlement workers" would live, hoping to share knowledge and culture with, and alleviate the poverty of, their low-income neighbors.

d) eastern business owners and former federalists