Groups had formed to ensure that Kansas entered the Union as a slave state. The judge during Celia's trial, William Hall, knew that Missourians wanted Celia hanged. Slavery and people's opinion of slavery at that time played a huge role in Celia's trial “Thus, on the eve of Celia's trial, the echoes of an increasingly violent fight over slavery in Kansas had shattered public tranquility in Missouri and threatened with discord, the fundamental political, legal and social institutions of the State" (McLaurin