The cause of most political dispute around 1820-1860 was mostly about slavery. There has been division between the North and the South, though compromise had usually sufficed in calming the controversy. However, nearing 1860, political compromise appeared useless. Comprises simply postponed addressing the issue, and led to even greater issues,compromise wasn’t working politically, socially,and economically for the nation. Before when their was hope for fixing the political disputes, many compromises were enacted. For example the Missouri Compromise. There was much debate as to whether new states hoping to join the Union would be slave states or free states. Before, there was equal amount of free and slave states each having 2 representatives. The making of having a new slave states can affect the balance in the senate. If Missouri became a slave state , the balance will be tipped off., because of this a new state had to change, Maine …show more content…
The issues became more about slavery now. More and more people voices started being heard about slavery. The opponents to slavery were called abolitionists. Abolitionists wanted to end slavery and set slaves free. In doc 2 abolitionists agreed that Congress could not do much to prevent slavery within slave states but could interfere with trafficking and exchange of slaves between states. One of the attempt to solve the issue, the House of Representatives issued the Gag rule stated in Doc 3, which was a strict rule passed by pro-southern Congressmen in 1836 to prohibit all discussion of slavery in the House of Representatives. Another compromise that was placed to fix the tension was the Compromise of 1850 . Which delayed the Civil War by putting the Fugitive Slave act, banning slave trade in DC, admitting California as a free state, splitting up the Texas territory, and instating popular sovereignty in the Mexican Cession. Stated in doc
of those of other descriptions on the 1st. year after this Government shall have been adopted and every year thereafter…”(Document 6). When it came to the issue of slavery, the southern and northern states broke into a bitter argument on whether slaves should be included into the state’s population or not. Southern states wanted to include slaves because the majority of their population were made up of slaves, but northern states feared that by allowing southern states to do so they might loose control of the House of Representatives. Unmoral as it may be, the 3/5th compromise eased the conflict between the Northern and Southern states.
New powers were granted to Congress to regulate the economy, currency, and the national defense, but provisions which would give the national government a veto power over new state laws was rejected. At the insistence of delegates from southern states, Congress was denied the power to limit the slave trade for a minimum of twenty years and slaves--although denied the vote and not recognized as citizens by those states--were allowed to be counted as 3/5 persons for the purpose of apportioning representatives and determining electoral votes. Most importantly, perhaps, delegates compromised on the thorny issue of apportioning members of Congress, an issue that had bitterly divided the larger and smaller states. Under a plan put forward by delegate Roger Sherman of Connecticut ("the Connecticut Compromise"), representation in the House of Representatives would be based on population while each state would be guaranteed an equal two senators in the new
During the early years of America, agricultural demands drove most of the economy allowing the South to demanded political protection. One of the protective measures was the Three-Fifths Compromise in 1787. The South wanted to count the slaves toward its population allowing for more representation. At the Constitutional Convention, the delegates decided to count a slave as three-fifths of a person for the purpose of determining the population for how many seats each State would have in the House. This solidified Southern control over Politics for several years to come.
Did you ever want to know why we were never to find a compromise on slavery which lead us to the civil war. Well he reason that the US was not able to find a compromise on slavery for 40 years. Is because the north and south were never able to agree on a compromise in the government and with the people. I will be showing you this through 3 sources that are. Uncle Toms Cabin, The Election of 1860 and John brown.
In the early 1800’s, and before, the United States prided itself on its ability to discuss political issues and express opinions without violence. However, around the 1850’s and 1860’s, emotions were escalating, and political compromise was thrown out the window. This was because the major political debate at the time was slavery, an issue that throughout America’s entire history was shown to create very strong opinions. Another reason for this change is that northerners and southerners were unwilling to communicate with each other in any meaningful way. Slavery was an issue for the United States since it before it even became a country, and if the Three Fifths Compromise had not been made, America may never have become independent.
The Breakdown of the Compromise of 1850 After the Mexican war, the balance of the slave and free states was being tested by the new state of California. If California was admitted as a free state, the southerners would succeed, while the northerners would revolt against the admittance of California as a slave state. The reasons for this reaction by the North and the South was because of slavery, and of the Senate’s balance. The main reason why the admittance of California was so heavily weighed, was because of the balance in the Senate. Since the North had a greater population, they had control over the House of Representatives, while the balance in the Senate was perfectly equal.
The three-fifths clause was the most important constitutional compromise because it granted the Southern states more political authority, which the Southerners then used to maintain slavery as an institution in the upcoming decades. The three-fifths clause made it so that three-fifths of a state’s slave population would be used in order to decide how many electoral votes and how many representatives a state could have. It was a compromise between the South (which relied on slaves for its economy) and the North (which had fewer slaves) for the sake of political unity. This clause guaranteed Southern states more political power than Northern States through votes or representation, so that laws would pass that allowed slavery to continue and flourish.
The Great Compromise which was founded at the Constitutional Convention wasn't formed without trouble. Many of the delegates that participated in the convention were wealthy landowners and lawyers, who owned many slaves. They failed to notice the diversity that excited within the nation. As they talked how to repair the Articles of Confederation, issues would arise that would create continuous debates amongst each other. One of the issues that would arise would be the nature of the new government.
One of the first stumbling blocks was how small states would be represented. The Compromise worked out was for the House of Representatives to be based upon population and the Senate to be equal among the states. This was very important because it would both affect the number of electoral votes and taxes paid to the federal government. With so many slaves in the South, the issue was, “should slaves be counted?” It was agreed upon that that slaves would be counted as three-fifths a person for both representation and taxation and clarifies adding whole numbers of free persons and three-fifths of all other persons.
However, that only further benefited Slave states. Slavery was disputed again when Northern states wanted the government to have complete power over trade with the other nations. Southern states depended heavily on trade and feared that the North would get enough votes to interfere with their slave and agricultural
One of the compromises made in the Constitutional Convention is the three-fifths compromise. In this compromise, the southerners wanted to add slaves to the population of the state they lived in. If slaves were included in their state’s population, that state would be able to add more representatives in the House of Representatives. Northerners did not agree with that statement because slaves did not have the right to vote. After the delegates compromised, they agreed that only three-fifths of the slave’s population would be counted into the state’s population.
Madison used his political eloquence to keep the House of Representatives uneasy over the question so that secession could be kept away from. He made sure that no constitutional termination was passed and that the board’s final recommendation hid slavery out of federal control. Ellis concludes that neither franklin nor Madison’s intervention discouraged the course of history. The slavery debate finally moved from congress to churches halls where it remained until civil war. Slavery, an underlining theme throughout this chapter, takes center stage in this chapter.
Between 1800 and 1850, western expansion played a major role in the sectional tensions between the North and South in America. Most of this would stem from whether or not new territory would be free or slave states. Later on, there would be compromises in place to alleviate the tension but disunity between the North and South was very prevalent. In 1803, the Louisiana Purchase from the French got a rise out of the New England Federalist party.
Slavery was a big issue in the 1800s. It divided the country into an argument between having slavery or not having slavery. It also made a conflict between the north and south and they could not agree on it. Some wanted to keep it, some wanted to get rid of it. The states would argue and they could not come up with a compromise.
The Compromise of 1850 was an effort by the United States Congress that was drafted by Henry Clay, who was both the U.S. Senator and the House Representative of Kentucky. This compromise was a series of acts passed in 1850, attempted to reconcile Northern and Southern interests to preserve the Civil War. After the start of the Mexican-American War, conflicts about whether to allow slavery in those new territories to polarized Northern and Southern of the United States raised up. Northerners were in favor the Compromise, since they thought it’s a good chance to stop slavery. On the other hand, Southerners were against it, they thought it threatened their political power because the join of territory--California would disturb the balance of 15 free states and 15 slave states.