How did Zachary Taylor's death lead to the Compromise of 1850?

Answer 1

Zachary Taylor was against the Compromise of 1850. When he died on the evening of July 9, 1850 of gastroenteritis, Taylor's successor was Millard Fillmore of New York, who was an ardent supporter of compromise. In Congress, leadership in the fight for a compromise passed to Stephen Douglas, a democrat from Illinois.

Douglas abandoned Clay's strategy of gathering all issues dividing the sections into a single bill. Instead, he introduced Clay's proposals one at a time. In this way, he was able to gather support from varying coalitions of Whigs and Democrats and Northerners and Southerners on each issue.

At the same time, banking and business interests as well as speculators in Texas bonds lobbied and even bribed congressmen to support compromise. Despite these manipulations, the compromise proposals never succeeded in gathering solid congressional support. In the end, only 4 senators and 28 representatives voted for every one of the measures. Nevertheless, they all passed.

As finally approved, the Compromise: * admitted California as a free state; * allowed the territorial legislatures of New Mexico and Utah to settle the question of slavery in those areas; * set up a stringent federal law for the return of runaway slaves; * abolished the slave trade in the District of Columbia; and * gave Texas $10 million to abandon its claims to territory in New Mexico east of the Rio Grande.