The Whig Party gained control of the Tennessee state legislature in 1850 and redrew the state's congressional districts, effectively gerrymandering the 9th district incumbent, Democrat Isham G. Harris, out of office. Etheridge sought the open seat, and running virtually unopposed, was easily elected to the Thirty-third Congress in 1853. Etheridge entered Congress at a time of growing sectional tension between the North and South over the issue of slavery. Though not opposed to slavery, Etheridge rejected its expansion into new territories. He was one of nine Southern representatives to vote against the Kansas-Nebraska Act in 1854, his main concern being the act's repeal of the Missouri Compromise.