Compromise of 1850?
Answer
Wiki User
03/10/2014
On January 29, 1850, the 70-year-old Clay presented a
compromise. For eight months members of Congress, led by Clay,
Daniel Webster, Senator from Massachusetts, and John C. Calhoun,
senator from South Carolina, debated the compromise. With the help
of Stephen Douglas, a young Democrat from Illinois, a series of
bills that would make up the compromise were ushered through
Congress.
According to the compromise, Texas would relinquish the land in
dispute but, in compensation, be given 10 million dollars -- money
it would use to pay off its debt to Mexico. Also, the territories
of New Mexico, Nevada, Arizona, and Utah would be organized without
mention of slavery. (The decision would be made by the territories'
inhabitants later, when they applied for statehood.) Regarding
Washington, the slave trade would be abolished in the District of
Columbia, although slavery would still be permitted. Finally,
California would be admitted as a free state. To pacify slave-state
politicians, who would have objected to the imbalance created by
adding another free state, the Fugitive Slave Act was passed.
u.s. civil war,u.s. history,slavery