Compromise of 1850

Growing Tensions Caused by Slavery (1844-1850)

Major Positions on Slavery Expansion

• Southern Position

  • Slavery was a constitutional right.
  • The Missouri Compromise of 1820 (aka the Compromise of 1820) had already decided where slavery could and could not exist.
    • The South wanted to extend the Missouri Compromise line to the Pacific Ocean.
    • Southern states viewed the Missouri Compromise as a guarantee for the continuation of their economy and way of life.
    • Any attempt to curtail slavery was seen as a move towards its destruction.

• Free Soil Movement

  • Composed of Northern Democrats and Whigs.
  • Wanted new territories to be the dominion of free laborers, not enslaved ones.
  • Conflicting Views:
    • Some didn't want slavery in new territories because they didn't think it was morally correct.
    • Some wanted new territories to be a land of white opportunity without competition from enslaved labor; they didn't necessarily want black people to settle there.
    • Abolitionists wanted to ban slavery everywhere, not only in the new territories, but also in the states where it existed.
    • Some members founded the Free Soil Party.

• Popular Sovereignty

  • The people living in each territory should decide the slavery question for themselves.
  • Problems:
    • Uncertain outcome for both sides.
    • Southerners viewed any curtailment of slavery as an attack on the whole system; therefore if popular vote went against them, it's viewed as an attack on their way of life.

Increased Tensions After Mexican-American War

• The Mexican-American War concluded and the United States gained a large amount of territory.

• California and New Mexico's entrance as free states caused Southerners to threaten secession from the Union.

  • The balance in the Senate was a key factor in keeping the Northern and Southern states together.

  • The House of Representatives represents states by population, but each state in the Senate is equal.

    • The Wilmot Proviso proposed banning slavery in the territories. It passed in the House but was struck down in the Senate because of the balance between slave and free states there.
    • Laws require a simple majority vote to pass.
    • If the seats in the Senate are exactly equal, and both halves vote exactly in line with their sectional beliefs, then the vote will always be fifty-fifty, so no laws banning slavery could ever be passed.

  • Admission of California and New Mexico as free states tipped the balance in the Senate toward the free states.

  • The Southern states were afraid that because of the growing imbalance, this could mean the end of slavery altogether.

Compromise of 1850

• Proposed by Henry Clay to calm tensions and prevent the breakup of the Union.
• Provisions:
  • The Mexican cession would be further divided into the Utah and New Mexico territories, and each would decide the slavery question by popular sovereignty.
  • California would be admitted as a free state.
  • The slave trade would be banned in Washington, D. C.
  • A stricter Fugitive Slave Law would be passed and enforced with vigor.
    • The Fugitive Slave Law would eventually undo any calm the compromise accomplished.
    • The North was generally against slavery, and the population of abolitionists was growing. Enforcing a law that required them to arrest enslaved people who had escaped their plantations and then returned them to the institution that they loathed was going to be difficult.