1.1
The political system and the balance of sectional interests in 1820
The question of North and South needs to be understood in the context of the wider political system. Although the question of slavery and the continual issue of the North- South balance was important in US politics, this never resulted in the formation of a 'northern party' and a 'southern party'. Everything to do with this political conflict happened within, as well as between, parties. It also influenced, and was influenced by, the tensions between the federal and states governments, and between the judicial and political structures.
The federal government and the states
The USA was a union of states which had agreed to set up a national, or federal, government. The capital was located on land between the slave states of Virginia and Maryland, on the Potomac River, Washington, District of Columbia. The capital was built around two key buildings representing two key institutions of federal government. The physical separation of these buildings symbolised their constitutional separation:
The White House was the home of the US president: head of state and head of government, who decided national policy. Elected indirectly by the people, directly by an electoral college of state delegates, the president had the power to approve or veto new laws created by - The US Congress, which drew up US laws, in the Capitol.
The US Congress itself comprised two distinct institutions:
The House of Representatives represented the people. It was directly elected by adult white male citizens on a state-by-state basis: the greater population a state had, the more representatives it had. In 1819, there were 156 representatives. They had to stand for re-election every two years. Article 1, Section 2 of the Constitution is important here. This allowed states to include in their population 60% of their slave population. This gave these states a greater proportion of representatives.
The Senate represented the states. Each state, however large or small, had the same number of senators: two. Thus, in 1819, there were 44 senators. They were chosen by the assemblies in each of the states. Each senator was appointed for six years. The Senate was seen as the defender of the rights of the states as distinct from those of the US people. In practice, the Senate was more important in protecting the rights of the slave states than the House of Representatives was.
For a proposal to become US law, the approval of both Houses was needed. This would prove significant during the lead up to the Civil War. This political system is based on two key concepts:
the separation of powers
And checks and balances.
The first maintains a distinction between the different branches of government. The second makes them work together. The intention was to insure that government was responsible and accountable, and could never become a tyranny. It could, however, (and still can) make the decision-making process long and difficult when there are entrenched and opposing views.
The Supreme Court and the practical application of the US Constitution
Of the three federal institutions of government in the 19th century, the US Supreme Court was the least noticed. It had been formed to decide whether the decisions and policies of the other parts of the government (Congress, the president, and the states and state governors) kept to the Constitution. If the Court decides that they are not, the only way around this is to change the Constitution, which is very difficult to do. It also interpreted the Bill of Rights, the first ten amendments of the Constitution, which protected the rights and freedom of the individual. There were nine Supreme Court judges, including one Chief Justice. They were nominated by the president and approved by the Senate. The president usually chose someone from his own section as Chief Justice. Once approved, they could stay in office for as long as they wished, usually for life. In theory, they could be dismissed, but, in the history of the Supreme Court, this has never happened.
While the Supreme Court had great legal authority, it had little practical power. Enforcing its judgements depended on the other branches of government. These had to accept that the rule of law was superior to politics.
Slavery and the American South
In the 1830s, Southern politicians began to refer to slavery as 'Our peculiar institution', They did not mean they thought slavery was odd or strange. They meant it was unique to the South. By then, slavery had existed for almost 200 years in the British colonies which had formed the USA in 1783. These slaves were transported from west Africa, but their masters had mostly come from west Europe. As Alexis de Tocqueville wrote in Democracy in America, first published in 1835-40: 'In modern times, the insubstantial and temporary fact of slavery is most fatally combined with the substantial and permanent difference of race.' (Penguin, 2003)
Though all slaves were black, it is worth noting that not all blacks were slaves (though most were) and not all slave- owners were white (though again most were). By 1860, there were about 4.4 million black people in the USA, and 3.9 million were slaves. More than half of the half-million free blacks lived in the South. Many free blacks did what they could to help emancipate slave blacks. It was also possible for free blacks to buy and own slaves themselves.
In 1783, slavery was legal in all of the original 13 American states. By 1800, six had abolished it. Many, in the South as well as the North, expected the gradual decline of slavery to continue, especially after 1808, when the overseas slave trade was banned. By the 1820s, all Northern states had banned slavery. In reality, in the states south of the Mason-Dixon Line, slavery actually increased. As the USA expanded into new territory, new slave states were formed and the slave population grew. This was especially the case in what became known as the Lower South, the region around the lower Mississippi. This was well-suited to the rapid development of cotton production and to the use of slave labour. An internal slave trade replaced the abolished external slave trade. This moved slaves from the old slave states to meet the growing demands for slaves in the Lower South. The shortage of slave labour caused the market price of a slave to double between the 1820s and the 1850s from $200 to $400. In the early 19th century, slavery was becoming more important to the South and to the USA, not less. In this way, the issue of slavery became symbolic of the differences between North and South; any attempt to either end slavery in one state or to expand it into new states created a difference in the balance of power between the two sections.
The defenders of slavery were as determined as the opponents of it. Both sections had a range of arguments - geographical, economic, social, cultural, moral and racial - to support their cause.
Slavery was not the only problem facing the balance of sectional interests. The questions of tariffs (taxes) on imported goods, a national bank, public investment in canals and railroads and the power of federal (national) government over the states were all equally important in causing debate and division across the nation. Slavery, however, gradually emerged as the principal issue dividing North from South. From the 1830s, more people in the North wanted to abolish slavery, which they saw, in addition to any moral or religious misgivings, as an insult to the US Constitution and a threat to the employment prospects of free people. These were known as abolitionists. In the South, leaders wanted to expand slavery in order to protect the South's position within a US Constitution founded on liberty.
A range of solutions were proposed to try to solve the problem as complex as the existence of slavery in a free country.
Sectional interests and the defence of slavery
On one side, defenders of slavery could maintain things as they were by using the constitutional rights of slave-owners to regain slaves who escaped to free states and/or take their slaves, as personal property, to any of the states, slave or free. Alternatively, they could have certain states identified as slave states. If slavery were limited to those slave states which had agreed the original constitution (six of the original 13), slave states would be outnumbered as new free states were formed, upsetting the sectional balance between North and South. This became impractical early in US history.
So, maintaining the existing balance meant slavery supporters had to find new lands to become slave states by expanding the USA to the south-west, or even separate from the USA as an independent country: a bold move known as disunion or secession. Most Southerners thought new lands to the south-west would allow for the expansion of slavery and so the formation of more slave states. Rather surprisingly, some argued the opposite case: that diffusion of the slave population to new states might lead to the gradual emancipation of slaves in the old southern states, such as Virginia. They reasoned that slaveholders and their slave property would move to the relatively empty lands to the south- west, reducing the number of slaves in the old states of the South. Emancipating the few slaves in many states would be easier for whites to achieve than emancipating the many in a few states in the Old South. Secession was frequently threatened by slave-owners, especially at times of crisis. Slave owners often quoted parallels with the 13 colonies breaking away from British control in 1776-83 to form the USA.
Sectional interests and emancipation
On the other side, opponents of slavery believed they could get rid of it by the following means:
Peaceful emancipation. Slavery could be abolished by agreement of key bodies, such as state assemblies and/ or Congress. Emancipation could be gradual and local.This had happened in the free states of the Northern section in the late 18th century, with each state making their own decisions about timescales. However, what compensation would slave-owners receive for the loss of property, and who would compensate them?
Military emancipation. Slaves might be freed as a strategy to defeat a rebellion, either by slaves or by their owners, in the context of a civil war. The international laws of war were not the same as the national laws of peacetime. However, freed slaves might encourage or provoke a wider rebellion.
Violent emancipation. Slavery could be abolished by force, perhaps in a revolution led by slaves. This had happened in modern-day Haiti between 1791 and 1804. US slave-owners feared something similar would happen in the USA. The most obvious examples are Nat Turner's short-lived rebellion of 1831 and John Brown's raid on Harpers Ferry in 1859 (see 'Growing strength of abolitionism' in 1.3).
In the end, as new lands were acquired from France and Mexico in the early 19th century, slavery expanded. It helped to maintain the crucial balance of free and unfree states. The 11 slave states and 11 free states in 1819 had grown to 15 and 15 by 1846. They formed a new status quo.
Although slavery was a key difference between the North and South, at this time, the issue was seen as a matter for sectional politics rather than a national concern. Supporters and opponents of slavery could be members of the same political party, for example.
In between these two groups of supporters and opponents, there were many, perhaps even the majority, who were neither pro-slavery nor abolitionist. They wanted to continue the political compromises which had established the USA and ensured its successful development. They looked to their political leaders in Washington DC to find these compromises as the USA expanded westwards. That expansion, however, made the compromises harder to agree on.
The impact of territorial expansion: westward expansion and absorption of Texas Manifest Destiny and the absorption of Texas
In December 1845, a journalist called John O'Sullivan wrote about: 'The right of our manifest destiny to overspread and possess the whole of the continent which Providence has given us for the development of the great experiment of liberty and self-government.'
In his article, he continued that: 'Other nations have undertaken (to check) our manifest destiny to overspread the continent.' This statement indicates the interference by other countries - especially great European powers, such as Britain - in the 'overspreading' process. This was notable in the annexation of Texas, which created a major change in the land area of the USA.
Texas had been part of the Spanish Empire, and then of Mexico when that country became independent in 1821.
The area had a low population and the settler population was vulnerable to attacks from Native Americans. When more settlers did arrive, many came from the USA, By the mid-19th century, the majority of Texans were of US descent, and Mexicans were a minority. Some of the newly arrived immigrants brought slaves with them, despite the fact that Mexico had outlawed slavery.
In 1836, Texas declared itself an independent republic. The new country looked to the USA for protection, not least against the British. Britain, as an imperial power with interests to defend, thought of intervening in the region. The American government offered to annex Texas. The people of Texas decided to accept. They were partly aware of their state's mounting debts and the threat of bankruptcy, which influenced this decision.
The original plan of the US president, John Tyler, had been for Texas to follow the usual path to statehood by first becoming a US territory. This in turn meant that Texas would be placed under the control of the US Congress. There was talk in Washington DC of dividing Texas, which was far larger than existing US states, into four or five smaller states, mostly slave. In the end, and most unusually, Texas was allowed to join the USA directly as its 28th state. This meant its borders could not be changed without its consent. However, as it wanted to remain a slave state, it had to agree to one change. This was to give any land north of a latitude of 36° 30' to the US government.
The Wilmot Proviso and the Mexican Cession
The new western border between Mexico and the USA, now including Texas, was disputed. The gap between the claims was some 160 km. The new US president, James Polk, a Southern Democrat and keen expansionist, had promised to annex Texas if elected. He ordered troops into the disputed land. Mexico responded, a clash occurred and the US Congress declared war. 'Mr Polk's War', as some called it, was not universally popular. Critics included two future presidents, Lincoln (already in politics) and Grant (currently a soldier), as well as the leading African American of the time, the former-slave Frederick Douglass. At the same time, O'Sullivan's concept of Manifest Destiny was controversial. Most Americans agreed that the USA was a special country with a special mission. Some, however, thought that the willingness to gain more land by going to war undermined that claim to be special. As the war got underway, politicians were already considering its likely consequences. A US victory would enable the USA to take territory from Mexico. Such lands could become slave states, disturbing the sectional balance in favour of the South. Slave power, as Northern critics called the politically powerful plantation owners of the south, had to be curbed.
One such critic was David Wilmot, a Democratic member of the US House of Representatives from the state of Pennsylvania. (As we examine pre-war politics in more detail, it is useful to remember three things about leading politicians: their party, their state and their section.
Wilmot was a Democrat. Democrats were usually pro- slavery. However, he was from Pennsylvania, which was part of the North and had abolished slavery as early as 1780.) In 1846, he introduced what became known as the Wilmot Proviso. He proposed that: 'As an express and fundamental condition to the acquisition of any territory from the Republic of Mexico by the United States, by virtue of any treaty which may be negotiated between them neither slavery nor involuntary servitude shall ever exist in any part of said territory, except for crime, whereof the party shall first be duly committed.' The Proviso was an attempt to prohibit slavery in lands expected to be acquired from Mexico. This paralleled the 1820 attempt to halt slavery in Missouri (see 'The Missouri Compromise', below).
However Wilmot's proposal was never passed by Congress, and was rejected twice, in 1846 and 1847. This rejection was the first instance of politicians dividing along sectional rather than party lines. The voting split for the Wilmot proposal highlighted the growing sectional differences between members of the same political party, a sign that these differences were starting to become more important to politicians.
Mexico was invaded following a clash between US forces and Mexican troops at the Rio Grande, inside the disputed territory. Mexico's capital was occupied. Then a peace treaty was negotiated and Mexico was obliged to surrender areas of its northern provinces to the USA. The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, signed in February 1848, saw what became known as the Mexican Cession incorporated into the USA. This was a vast area, covering more than a million km², including modern- day California. A few months after California was ceded by Spain, gold was discovered and the 1849 gold rush began.
Territorial expansion
John O'Sullivan was writing in 1845, fewer than 60 years after the USA became independent. During those years, the USA expanded with great speed, acquiring lands from each of the European empires based in North America. The USA in 1789 was 13 former British colonies of about 930 000 km² on the eastern seaboard. Then the country steadily added other lands in the west:
1783 Britain handed over the North West Territory, totalling 670000 km².
1803 The Louisiana Purchase of lands from France gained another 2 million km².
1819 Spain agreed to hand over Florida, another 186000 km².
1840s USA signed treaties with Britain to settle its northern borders, especially in Oregon.
1845 Texas, by then an independent state itself, agreed to join the USA, adding another 1.8 million k * m ^ 2 .
1846-48 Following the war with Mexico, the Mexican Cession totalled over 1 million k * m ^ 2
1867 After the US Civil War, Russia sold Alaska and its 1.7 million k * m ^ 2 to the USA.
Within 70 years up to 1850, the USA had increased in area more than six-fold. Most new areas were sparsely populated, either by settlers from Europe or by Native Americans. The more fertile parts of these relatively empty spaces attracted many who wanted to make a new life in pursuit of the happiness that the Declaration of Independence declared their right.
Impact of population growth and movement
During the period that the area of the USA grew, the country's population also grew very rapidly:
In these 40 years, US population more than trebled. In the 1850s alone, more than 2 million people came from Europe.
An important cause of this unprecedented growth was immigration from western Europe into the free states of the North. In the 1830s, large numbers of migrants started arriving from Britain and from other parts of Europe. There were both push and pull factors in this process. Factors pushing people to leave Europe were economic, social and political. These included the catastrophic crop failure which led to the Irish Potato Famine (1845-49) and the failed revolutions which took place in several countries in 1848. Factors pulling people to the USA included greater political freedom and economic opportunities, such as jobs in the towns and cheap land. From 1849, the discovery of gold in California was also a magnet.
This increased flow of immigrants produced a reaction in 'nativism', a political movement to favour people born in the USA over those who had migrated there (see 'The party system', below).
Immigration tended to affect the North more than the South as the opportunities the new arrivals were looking for were more likely to be found there. As a result, the Northern population was growing much faster. In wartime, this difference in population size and speed of growth would acquire a new significance. A major consequence was the movement of peoples into the new lands west of the Appalachian Mountains. People in the South were also keen to move westwards, but for different reasons. In the South, plantation farming of the Old South to the east had exhausted the soil. Slave- owners went west to find new fertile lands on which to grow the new profitable crop of cotton.
These new lands and peoples needed law and order, and government. To provide this, by 1860, the USA had created another 20 states together with another six territories. They covered all the modern-day states apart from Alaska and Hawaii.
These issues could cause great problems, especially when it came to deciding whether the proposed state become slave or free. The two sections needed to keep in balance, to avoid either North or South becoming more powerful. Each time a territory converted into a state that balance came into question as politicians calculated how the changing population numbers would affect the balance of power in Washington.
The wealth of the USA
There is one other major aspect of US history it is important to consider during this period and that is the country's wealth. So, in the 60 years to 1850, while the population of the USA grew rapidly, national wealth increased some 12 times, a huge amount. That economic growth was based upon many factors. Perhaps the most significant factor was the increased cotton production by the slave plantations of the South and its export via Northern ports to factories in Britain. According to Sven Beckert (Empire of Cotton, Penguin, 2014): 'More than half of all American exports between 1815 and 1860 consisted of cotton.' Slavery became more important to the wealth of the whole country.
As a result, the Southern states became increasingly prosperous, even though that prosperity was very unevenly distributed. Historians have debated how Southern and Northern states compared for economic success. A longstanding view was that, with the exception of a minority of wealthy slave-owning landowners, many white people and almost all black people in the mid-19th- century USA were poor or very poor. For some time now, however, there have been those willing to argue that, in fact, the South's economy was in a good shape overall, certainly as far as its agriculture was concerned. They concede that the North was more advanced in industrial manufacturing. This proved important in the Civil War,where the better-established industrial sector would take up the task for supplying armaments. One reason why there was a widespread assumption of Southern poverty is likely to have been that there was such poverty after the Civil War. However that was created partly by defeat and partly by the destruction of a socio-economic structure.
One cause for relative poverty in Northern states and relative wealth in the South is likely to have been immigration. With fewer immigrants, the South had a more established (white) population which had had the chance to accumulate wealth. With more immigrants, the North held more people who owned only what they had carried with them. This was often very little since they had often migrated specifically to escape poverty. In wartime, however, with the need to recruit soldiers as each battle results in casualties, this imbalance would favour the North.
Attempts at compromise
Between 1820 and 1860, there were seven attempts to resolve the issue of slavery within a rapidly expanding democracy with clear constitutional rules to live by. They differed in form.
The Missouri Compromise of 1820
In the first, which came in 1819-20, two political parties, the Democrats and the Whigs, worked together. The repercussions of the crisis it attempted to avert were still being felt when the Civil War broke out more than 40 years later. It formed the context within which the outcomes of the war with Mexico in 1846-48 can be understood.
In December 1818, the citizens (in this case all white men) of the US territory of Missouri petitioned Congress to become a US state. Missouri was the first territory wholly west of the Mississippi river to apply for statehood. Whether it was free or slave would form a precedent for other territories in the Louisiana Purchase region acquired from France. As Missouri already had some 10000 slaves in 1810-half its total population - it was expected that Missouri would become another slave state. It soon became obvious that this was far from certain.
In February 1819, the bill to allow Missouri to apply to become a state was blocked by the House after a New York representative, James Tallmadge, proposed an amendment preventing the expansion of slavery in Missouri.
This clause reproduced part of a document passed before the USA was finally established, the Northwest Ordinance of 1787. This was presumably deliberate. This Ordinance was a set of articles which described the principles for governing the territories which the British had surrendered to the USA in 1783. principles for governing the territories which the British had surrendered to the USA in 1783.
Abolitionists argued that the acceptance of slavery, never mentioned by name in the Constitution, was only a concession to a part of the USA and never intended as national policy. They argued that slavery was incompatible with the underlying principles of the US Constitution and that Congress had the right to impose conditions on any new state joining the USA. Supporters of slavery argued, however, that the Constitution did not give Congress the right to decide on the constitutions of individual states. Only the states had the right to do so. Here was the concept of states' rights, which was to become an important element of US politics. The anti-slavery group had other concerns too. One was political. They argued that the Constitution already gave special rights to slave states, such as the three-fifths clause. This clause stated that three-fifths of the slave population of a state was included in the population count used when allocating representation in Congress. Allowing the expansion of slavery would further tilt the balance of federal power towards slave states. The other concern was moral. Many argued that slavery was wrong, and that it offended the idea of the rights of man, upon which the USA was founded. These arguments, and others, were heard again and again over the next 40 years as the US people considered what to do about slavery in their country.
By skilful leadership, mainly by Henry Clay, the leader of the House of Representatives, in the Congress of 1819-20, the two sections agreed the following compromise:
Missouri would be admitted as a state without any restrictions on slavery.
Maine, in the north-east, keen to become a state, would be admitted at the same time as a free state, thus ensuring the balance of free and slave states.
With the exception of Missouri itself, there would be no slavery in US lands gained via the Louisiana Purchase above the 36° 30' line of latitude.
The dividing line of 36° 30' north was not a new idea.
When petitioning for statehood, Missouri had proposed its southern border would be 36° 30'. The line of latitude was already the border between several states to the east of the Mississippi river. This line of demarcation was an amendment to the Missouri bill made by a Northern senator from Illinois, Jesse B. Thomas, himself an advocate of slavery. The line would compensate the anti-slavery group for their acceptance of Missouri being a slave state. All new states created from Louisiana Purchase lands north of 36° 30' would be free states. This demarcation was accepted by the pro-slavery group because it meant they had secured Missouri as a slave state.
The president, James Monroe, from Virginia and himself a slave-owner, thought of vetoing the compromise bill on constitutional grounds. He argued that Congress did not have the constitutional power to impose limits on new states. He eventually decided that such a move would risk civil war. He signed the bill in March 1820.
There was a second Missouri Compromise, often overlooked, specific to Missouri and its becoming a state. The slave constitution it devised was unacceptable to Congress. It took all of Henry Clay's skills to gloss over the differences and thus achieve the necessary compromise in 1821.
The party system
In 1819-21, politicians compromised over the expansion of the USA ensuring a balance of free and slave states. The balance was sustained in the 1830s, when Arkansas and Michigan joined, slave and free.
In the 1840s, maintaining the balance became a problem once more as a result of the annexation of Texas and the Mexico Cession. In Washington, national politicians grappled with the consequences of further American expansion. This time it took two years for them to come to agreement. They were finding it harder to agree. By the 1840s, the USA had two national parties, each representing groups from both North and South, the Democrats and the Whigs. They had different visions of how the USA should develop.
The democrats:
Important people-Built up in the 1820s by Andrew Jackson, one of the great figures of US history.
A former general, Jackson was elected president in 1828 and again in 1832 Once Jackson stood down from the party, leading Democratic politicians of the 1840s included Martin van Buren from New York and John Calhoun from South Carolina.
Potential points in favour- They believed the USA was essentially a rural, agricultural society. They placed great importance on states' rights: the freedom of states to govern themselves free from federal government interference.
Potential points against- They were opposed to expanding the power of the national government, but were prepared to use that government to expand the USA to the west, thereby gaining more farmland.
The Whigs:
Important people- Leading Whigs of the time included Henry Clay from Kentucky and Daniel Webster from Massachusetts.
Potential points in favour- Of the same generation as John Calhoun, both died in 1852. There were no leaders equal in skill and talent to replace them.
Whigs wanted to develop the industrial power of the USA, using the national government to do so, via tariffs to protect new industries from foreign competition, by national support for building canals and railroads across the country and by re-establishing a national bank, which Andrew Jackson had abolished.
Potential points against- The Whigs emerged in the 1830s, in part to oppose the success of 'King Andrew', as President Jackson had been labelled by his critics.
It is important to realise that these two parties were national, representing voters from both North and South. They were able to do so because, in the 1830s and 1840s, slavery was seen as a sectional matter, not an issue for national political differences. Thus the Whig Party of the 1840s consisted of two main groups: from the North, the Conscience Whigs and from the South, the Cotton Whigs. Not everyone was satisfied with the two-party system, so other parties were formed. In the 1840s and early 1850s, they included:
Liberty Party, to support the abolition of slavery.
Native American Party, to restrict large-scale immigration from Catholic Europe, such as Ireland and Italy. The word 'native' in its title meant people who had been born in the USA as opposed to moving there from another country. They were nicknamed the 'Know Nothings' because of a secret wing: when asked whether they were members, supporters were supposed to say that they knew nothing.
Free Soil Party, to limit the expansion of slavery into western territories in order to defend paid free labour against competition from unpaid slave labour.
None of these lasted very long.
The Compromise of 1850
The best policy for dealing with the complex problems raised by the institution of slavery was an issue which perplexed mid-19th-century America. This happened continuously at state level and occasionally at national level. After the Missouri Compromise, it was almost 30 years before national actions were needed to address the peculiar problems of slavery. The failure of the Wilmot Proviso, however, and concerns following the start of the war with Mexico raised anxieties surrounding the issue of slavery and on how the balance between sections was to be maintained. Slavery was becoming a national, rather than a purely sectional, issue.
The Missouri Compromise involved just two future states, Missouri and Maine, and the latter only as a counter- balance. The 1850 Compromise involved four new states or territories: the status of California, New Mexico and Utah, and boundary changes for Texas. In addition to addressing potential sectional problems, Congress also agreed to two further changes concerning slavery: one concerning the national capital, Washington DC, and the other the treatment of fugitive slaves.
Senator Stephen Douglas was a leading Northern Democrat. He made a speech to a large audience in Chicago in October 1850, just weeks after the Compromise had been finally agreed by Congress, and listed the six key points of the Compromise. The first two were:
The admission of California with her free constitution
The creation of a territorial government for Utah, leaving the people to regulate their own domestic institutions.
The third was the creation of a territorial government for New Mexico. These were the lands acquired from Mexico. California came straight into the USA as a state in 1850. Utah and New Mexico became US territories. Utah allowed slavery in 1852 and became a US state in 1896. New Mexico never allowed slavery and didn't become a state until 1912.
Douglas explained their membership in terms of what he called 'the great fundamental principle that every people ought to possess the right of forming and regulating their own internal concerns and domestic institutions in their own way'. This is the principle which became known as popular sovereignty, a doctrine Douglas was to make his own in the next few years and which would be adopted by the Democrat Party.
Point 4 of the Compromise dealt with the adjustment of the disputed boundary with Texas. Texas agreed that its northern border should be the 36°30' parallel. In return, the USA paid off the public debts which Texas had acquired when independent.
Point 5 was the abolition of the slave trade in the District of Columbia. Slave markets in the District of Columbia, in which the capital Washington stood, were banned, but only for those bringing slaves in and selling them for transfer to another state. Abolitionists had campaigned for the end of the slave trade, but slave-owners were concerned this would set a precedent for banning slavery in Southern states. Slavery as such, however, remained legal in DC.
The final point Douglas highlighted was the Fugitive Slave Bill. This bill, which would later become an act, strengthened the powers of those wanting the return of their slaves who, after running away, had been recaptured in another state. By 1848, 12 Northern states had passed laws known as Personal Liberty Laws, which aimed to help slaves escaping from Southern states. Slave-owners in the South argued that these laws undermined their constitutional right to have their slaves returned to them, and had demanded a new Fugitive Slave Act to enforce this. The new bill gave more power to federal government officials to help slave-owners regain what they saw as their property. The act was seen as necessary because of a Supreme Court judgement of 1842 in the case of Prigg v. Pennsylvania. The case dated back to 1832, when slave- catcher Edward Prigg forcibly took a black woman named Margaret Morgan from Pennsylvania to Maryland, where she had formerly been a slave, and returned her to her one-time owners. Since 1780 Pennsylvania had forbidden free blacks being taken from the state and enslaved and so Prigg was convicted of abduction by a Pennsylvania court. As there had been a federal law about the returning of run-away slaves since 1793, Prigg's lawyers appealed to the US Supreme Court on the basis that the 1788 Pennsylvania law had been rendered void by the 1793 federal law. The Supreme Court agreed, adjudging the Pennsylvania laws unconstitutional.
Completing the deal had taken Congressional leaders many months to negotiate. Henry Clay, the leading Whig, came out of retirement to help ease the passage of the Compromise though Congress. He failed, but Douglas took over and made a series of deals to see the Compromise through. The Compromise was supported by both Whig and Democrat parties in their party conventions of 1852.
The compromise was an example of Congress working to resolve national tensions relating to slavery. Once they had agreed the Compromise of 1850, most politicians returned home from Washington believing that it would last. After all, the Missouri Compromise had lasted for more than a quarter of a century. Senator Douglas assured his audience: 'The South has not triumphed over the North, nor has the North achieved a victory over the South.' In the years 1820 and 1850, the issue of slavery moved from being a point of local disagreement to being a point of major dispute in national politics. Despite this, a policy of compromise was maintained, though it was one which required the presence of talented negotiators to make it work. New lands and new immigrants were absorbed into the state system, and still the spirit of compromise was sustained. The principle of popular sovereignty had managed to make the compromise projects seem fully democratic and in keeping with America's national values.
The basic assumptions that there had to be dividing lines and a maintenance of balance held up. How many of the legislators that voted through the latest compromise foresaw how quickly it would unravel? Were its changes to the legal status and treatment of runaway slaves expected to become a new point of dispute quite as dangerous to the USA as the issue of territorial expansion?