What Was the Compromise of 1850? by Mike Streich

The 31^st Congress was called to order December 3, 1849. After weeks of sorting through petitions, Henry Clay of Kentucky presented eight resolutions designed to “settle and adjust amicably all existing questions of controversy…arising out of the institution of slavery.” The Senate began debating his resolution the following Tuesday, February 5, 1850. By the adjournment of the Senate that summer, the “Compromise of 1850” was law, sectional tension was higher, and one of the great Senate thinkers, John C Calhoun, had died.

 

The Resolutions of Henry Clay

 

California would be admitted as a free-soil state based on its state constitution

Congress should not introduce or “exclude” slavery in any of the new territories

The western boundary of Texas should conform to the Rio del Norte

The U.S. government will pay Texas pre-annexation monetary claims

Texas will “relinquish…any claim which is has to any part of New Mexico

Slavery will continue to exist as an institution in the District of Columbia as long as it exists in Maryland

The sale or slave trade within the District will be abolished

A stronger “fugitive slave” provision be enacted

Congress has “no power to prohibit or obstruct the trade in slaves between slaveholding States…

 

Debating the Resolutions

 

Although Senator Clay envisioned a compromise designed to give the North and the South some measure of satisfaction, it stirred up a hornet’s nest of often angry debate. Many senators proposed amendments favorable to their constituencies. Senator Pratt of Maryland argued for federal compensation to slaveholders that lost income resulting from fugitive slaves. Jefferson Davis of Mississippi favored extending the 1820 Missouri Compromise line to the Pacific.

 

John C. Calhoun, whose speech was read by Virginia’s Senator Mason, called for a constitution amendment establishing two sectional Presidents. Calhoun, already frail, died in March. William Henry Seward’s speech referred to a “higher law” that superseded the Constitution in terms of slavery. Both Seward and Salmon Chase of Ohio urged the adoption of the Wilmot Proviso. Stephen Douglas of Illinois supported the resolutions in an attempt to assuage sectional discord. Although representing a Northern state, Douglas owned slaves himself through his second marriage.

 

Although President Zachary Taylor urged the speedy admittance of California into the Union, he opposed the expansion of slavery into the other territories. According to Historian Frederick Merk, “Taylor would have met any southern move toward secession at the head of the United States army.” Taylor, however, died in July and the new President, Millard Fillmore, supported the resolutions.

 

Results of the Compromise

 

Passage of the separate bills was due in large part to the efforts of Stephen Douglas, who maneuvered the legislation through Congress after Clay returned to Kentucky. Southerners, for the most part, viewed the Compromise with disdain and in four southern states, conventions met to consider secession.

 

Northerners also opposed parts of the Compromise, most notably the new Fugitive Slave Act. Both New York and Wisconsin attempted to nullify this act, without success. The issue of extending slavery beyond those states in which the institution already existed would dominate political and sectional thought for the next decade and act as a catalyst in the eventual outbreak of war.

 

Sources:

 

William W. Freehling, The Road to Disunion: Secessionists at Bay 1776-1854 (Oxford University Press, 1990).

Frederick Merk, History of the Westward Movement (Alfred A. Knopf, 1978).

Journal of the United States Senate, 31^st Congress, The Library of Congress, “American Memory”

 

 

What do Representative George Santos and Prince Harry have in Common? They both lie. Why use the term "fabrication?" Today's German Bild (13.January 2023) has an excellent article on the contradictions and "fibs" in Spare.

WHAT WAS THE "CORRUPT BARGAIN" ASSOCIATED WITH HENRY CLAY IN 1824?

PERHAPS KEVIN MCCARTHY CAN ANSWER THAT QUESTION IF HE STUDIED AMERICAN HISTORY IN HIGH SCHOOL.

 Henry Clay attempted the Presidency three times yet each time he miscalculated the mood of the American people. In 1824 he came in last in a four-way race; building his campaign on Andrew Jackson’s Bank Veto in 1832, Clay failed to realize that voters saw the veto as an extension of Jackson’s heroic nature and champion of the common man. Finally, in 1844, Clay’s “waffling” on the issue of Texas annexation caused enough voters in the North to switch their support to James Birney and the new Liberty Party, costing him crucial swing states.

 

The 1824 Election

 

When the results of the 1824 election were tabulated, Henry Clay was in fourth place with 37 electoral votes. Although no candidate received enough electoral votes to win the presidency, John Quincy Adams would be selected by a vote in the House of Representatives. As Speaker of the House, Henry Clay played a pivotal role in denying Andrew Jackson the presidency. Jackson, with 99 electoral votes and almost three times the popular votes of Clay and William Crawford, would never forget Clay’s role in the so-called “corrupt bargain.”

 

1832 and the Bank of the United States

 

President Andrew Jackson rejected a premature rechartering of the SBUS(Second Bank of the US) in 1832 after Henry Clay convinced bank President Nicholas Biddle to seek a new charter. It was the issue Clay hoped would bring him into the White House. Portraying Jackson as a despotic tyrant and recalling the images of George III, Clay and his followers believed that the voters would agree and retire Jackson.

 

Jackson, however, was seen as a man of the people, a hero who championed the cause of simple, hard working Americans. Jackson, who hated all banks, saw the national bank as the “great whore of Babylon.” Everywhere he went, everyday people cheered him as their advocate. The bank issue backfired. According to Paul Boller, “For the first time in American history a President took a strong stand on an important social issue and then asked for the approval of the voters at the polls.” [1]

 

The Annexation of Texas and the 1844 Election

 

The annexation of Texas was the chief issue in the 1844 election. Democrat James K Polk favored annexation. Significantly, Polk’s stance was based on his sincere views favoring immediate expansionism. Polk wanted to unite the nation between both oceans, assert American claims in the Oregon Territory, and bring Texas into the Union.

 

Henry Clay, however, viewed the issue in terms of his own presidential ambitions. At first, Clay opposed Texas annexation, gambling on the Northern vote. Northern voters, for the most part, rejected the idea of bringing in another slave state. Sensing that his chance of victory might be better if he switched positions, Clay came out for annexation. This cost him crucial Northern votes.

 

Page Smith [2] gives an interesting analysis of the 1844 vote. Polk won the election with less than 1 percent of the popular vote, yet in pivotal states like Ohio, James Birney, the antislavery candidate, polled over 8,000 votes. In Pennsylvania Polk won “by a bare 6,000 votes out of more than 328,000 cast.” Birney’s total in the election was 62,300. Had Clay not switched his position on Texas, many of the Birney votes might have gone to him.

 

Although Henry Clay never became President, his long political career left an indelible mark on American History. Returned to the National Senate in 1850, Clay would endeavor to craft a final compromise designed to avert Civil War. For this he was vilified by many Southerners.

 

Sources:

 

[1] Page Smith, The Nation Comes of Age: A People’s History of the Ante-Bellum Years (New York: McGraw-Hill Book Company, 1981) p. 207.

[2] Paul F. Boller, Jr. Presidential Campaigns From George Washington to George W. Bush (Oxford University Press, 2004) p. 53.