During this time, the 30-state nation was divided equally between 15 free states and 15 slave states. With the addition of vast new, agriculturally-rich territories, including California, the debate over slavery intensified dramatically. California itself was divided over the issue, as a large number of slave-owning Southerners had travelled to California to seek their fortunes in the 1849 Gold Rush, and many brought their slaves. Many miners expressed concern that slaveholders accompanied by slaves had an unfair advantage in the mining camps and that slavery's inherent inequality violated "the independent entrepreneurial sprit of the mines." However, taking slaves into California, which had no laws or enforcement mechanisms for maintaining the institution, turned out to be quite risky for the slave owners themselves. The territory had no slave patrols, nor local police interested in maintaining slavery, so slave escapes were quite common.