Compromise of 1850
From 1820 until 1850, America continued to fulfill its Manifest Destiny as it expanded west to the Pacific Ocean. However, controversy over the extension of slavery continued to divide Americans in the North and the South. After the Gold Rush in 1849, California was ready to apply for statehood, but because its geographic location was partly below the 36-30 parallel, southerners complained about it becoming another free state in the Union. An elderly Henry Clay once again came to the forefront to resolve the dispute. Since he understood that many southerners were becoming more concerned about their slaves running and escaping to freedom in the north, there was an opportunity to pacify the South by initiating a new fugitive slave law (requiring that runaway slaves be returned to their masters in the South) while allowing California to enter as a free state. Along with this compromise, the Utah and New Mexico territories would be opened to popular sovereignty, which would allow the people of those eventual states to decide for themselves on the issue of slavery. Also, slave trading in the nation’s capital (Washington D.C.) would be outlawed. While both northern and southern politicians would applaud the political compromise of 1850, both sides in the course of time would eventually see it as a calamity.
After the “Bloodhound Bill” (fugitive slave law) went into effect, southerners especially became resentful as runaway slaves were not returned and northerners were increasingly ignoring the law. Northerners had never been forced to look and deal with slavery directly. It had always been something peculiar to the South. But now northerners were being asked to participate in not only acknowledging slavery, but to actually have runaway slaves rounded up by authorities and forcibly sent back to the south. This appalled many in the North who had been neutral on the issue. Northerners and Southerners became even more antagonistic towards each other. It was becoming more difficult to compromise on the issue of slavery as more and more northerners had their eyes opened towards this bad habit of slavery that America was not growing out of. Southerners too were becoming more stubborn and unwilling to continue to be a part of a nation where their interests were being threatened. |
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