The correct answer is A) California would enter as a free state and upset the balance. The South’s loss of influence would mean they could not block antislavery laws.
The statement that best explains why California’s application for statehood caused a sectional crisis is "California would enter as a free state and upset the balance. The South’s loss of influence would mean they could not block antislavery laws."
The issue for this controversy is that eas that the entrance of the state of California to the Union as a free slave would change the legislative balance, favoring the Northern, pro-abolitionists states. California was part of the territories gained by the United States after the Mexican-American War. There were many struggles in Congress about the issue of slavery and that is when Congress ended up with the Compromise of 1850. California was going to be admitted to the Union as a free state but the slave trade was prohibited in Washington D.C. and the residents of Utah and New Mexico would define if they allowed slavery in those states.
