Compromise of 1850
New territories, new responsibilities
With the acquisition of vast new territories in the contemporary regions of the Rocky Mountain west/desert southwest- Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico, Nevada, and Utah - , and the Pacific coast - California -, the United States government confronted considerable new responsibilities, including if, how, and when the peoples, primarily Mexicans and indigenous societies such as the Hopi, Navajo and Utes, already living in these regions would be incorporated into the United States and whether they would be eligible for American citizenship . While Congress debated the incorporation and potential divisions of these new territories into states, significant demographic shifts impacted the decision-making processes and results of these debates.
Immigrant labor
In the 1840s, large new waves of immigrants, particularly from Germany and Ireland, arrived in the United States, fleeing political instability and violence in Germany and poverty and starvation from the potato famine in Ireland. In California, the first significant waves of Chinese immigrants arrived, drawn by the gold rush of 1849; these Chinese immigrants were also fleeing political instability and violence. Significant numbers of American citizens protested the arrival of these new immigrants, citing cultural, linguistic, and religious differences, and frequently citing the new immigrants as economic threats to white, primarily Protestant, workers. In the mid 1840s, the Native American Party, later known as the American Party or more commonly as the Know Nothing Party, called for strict limits on immigration, labor rights, and expanded rights for women; the “know nothing” name stemmed from their public disavowals and/or lack of knowledge about the American Party when questioned by outsiders.
Free soil, free speech, free labor, and free men
The short-lived Free Soil Party emphasized its opposition to the expansion of slavery into newly acquired territories but often did not oppose the continuation of slavery in states where it was already enshrined and protected. Their reference to “free speech” reflected longstanding northern resentment of the gag rule used in the House of Representatives to prevent the discussion of antislavery legislation, while the “free labor” and “free men” elements of their platform reinforced their opposition to the expansion of slavery and their desire to protect gainful employment in newly acquired territories for white men. The previously referenced nativist, anti-immigrant, political and cultural movements and free soilers combined to create new challenges for the American government, particularly when confronted by the demands of Californios to only enter the union as a free state.
Upending a precarious balance
For nearly 30 years since the Missouri Compromise, the United States had maintained an unwritten parity of free and slave states in the United States Senate, a precarious balance that effectively permitted slaveowners to block antislavery legislation in Congress. When the territorial delegation from California petitioned Congress for statehood after Californians hosted their own constitutional convention in 1849, it insisted upon entering the union as a free state. After California was admitted as a free state on September 9, 1850, the country had 16 free states and 15 slave states; over the course of the next 10 years, 3 more states were admitted, Kansas, Minnesota and Oregon, all of which entered the union as free states.
The Californian, March 15, 1848
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## Popular sovereignty
Southerners were infuriated by Californians’ insistence on entering the union as a free state as they believed that it violated the **36’ 30”** line that they believed extended to the Pacific coast; furthermore, they argued that the **Wilmot Proviso** and the platform of the Free Soil Party called for further violations of principles they believed long established in American law and custom. As debates over the incorporation of newly acquired territory from Mexico raged in Congress, generational shifts in its leadership ushered in new approaches and solutions. The so-called **lions of the Senate**, **John C. Calhoun**, **Henry Clay**, and **Daniel Webster**, were all in failing health, - Calhoun died on March 31, 1850, while both Clay and Webster passed away in 1852 - and newer senators, including **Stephen Douglas** of Illinois and **William Seward** of New York, emerged during these debates. Stephen Douglas argued for the adoption of **popular sovereignty**, allowing white male settlers to vote on the potential extension of slavery into newly acquired territories, in what would become Arizona and Mexico; as you will see in lesson 6.6, Douglas returned to this principle 4 years later in disputes over the **Kansas** and **Nebraska** territories as well as in his famous debates with **Abraham Lincoln** during the Illinois senate campaign in 1858.
## Outlawing the slave trade, but not slavery, in the national capital
As the United States became more established internationally and **Washington DC** gradually became more important diplomatically, American diplomats and politicians heard increased concerns and complaints from foreign diplomats and visitors about the open-air slave trading markets located just a few blocks from the US **Capitol** building. More countries had outlawed slavery by the late 1840s and their representatives expressed distaste and revulsion at the continued buying and selling of enslaved persons in the capital city of Jefferson’s “empire of liberty.” In the **Compromise(s) of 1850**, the buying and selling, but not possession and transportation, of enslaved persons in Washington DC was outlawed, further angering southern and border state slaveowners.
## A harsher fugitive slave law
As various forms of antislavery, including **abolitionism**, gained numbers and political strength in the 1840s, slaveowners demanded stricter enforcement and amendments of existing state and federal laws, including the **Fugitive Slave Act of 1793**. Slaveowners descried the **underground railroad**, the various antislavery networks that helped hundreds of enslaved persons escape forced labor and bondage by moving into free states and even into **Canada**. During the deliberations over the organization and incorporation of the newly acquired territories from Mexico, frequently referred to as the **Mexican cession**, southern members of Congress insisted upon stricter and more punitive legislation to discourage and/or prevent enslaved persons from escaping and from abolitionists assisting these runaway enslaved persons. In the **Fugitive Slave Act of 1850**, financial and prison penalties were dramatically increased from the original Fugitive Slave Act of 1793; additionally, law enforcement throughout the United States was required to assist in the capture and return of runaway enslaved persons to the slaveowners. Individuals suspected of being runaway enslaved persons were denied **habeas corpus** rights and free African Americans in the north were frequently harassed and even abducted by slave catchers, leading to fraught confrontations in the streets of **Boston** and other northern cities in the 1850s.
## A thoroughly dissatisfying compromise
Early in the debates over what eventually became the Compromise(s) of 1850, it became apparent that there was insufficient support to pass an **omnibus bill** containing all of the relevant provisions. Stephen Douglas eventually enacted a strategy whereby the most vociferous opponents of any particular provision did not vote on that provision in Congress, ultimately shepherding the various compromises through in a series of votes on individual provisions, such as the admission of California as a free state and the passage of the new Fugitive Slave Act. While these parliamentary maneuvers prevailed in the immediate term, it was immediately apparent that none of the primary elements of the Compromise(s) of 1850 enjoyed widespread support, portending future controversies and conflict.
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