Millard Fillmore and the Compromise of 1850
Yesterday was the anniversary of the death of Zachary Taylor, so it should come as no surprise for today to be the 160th anniversary of Millard Fillmore becoming president. Fillmore was Taylor's running mate, but they were kind of like Oscar and Felix, the odd couple, in many ways. Taylor was a southerner from Virginia, while Fillmore was a northerner from New York. They disagreed on slavery, but not in the way you might expect. When it came to the new western territories taken from Mexico in the Mexican-American War, Taylor had wanted the new states to be free states, while Fillmore supported slavery in those states. Fillmore said "God knows that I detest slavery, but it is an existing evil ... and we must endure it and give it such protection as is guaranteed by the Constitution."
When Fillmore became president, he fired most of Taylor's cabinet and appointed his own, men whose views on slavery accorded more with his own. One of the controversies of the day was whether California would become a state. (Henry Clay's proposed so in a bill and it aroused violent arguments for and against extending slavery there. This led to what is known as the Compromise of 1850. Illinois Senator Stephen Douglas presented five separate bills to the Senate, bills that would
1. Admit California as a free state.
2. Settle the Texas boundary and compensate the state for lost lands.
3. Grant territorial status to New Mexico.
4. Place federal officers at the disposal of slaveholders seeking runaway slaves (The Fugitive Slave Act)
5. Abolish the slave trade, but not slavery, in the District of Columbia
Each measure obtained a majority, and, by September 20, President Fillmore had signed them into law.
The compromise of 1850 postponed civil war, but did not prevent it. In the next 10 years, the north grew more wealthy and more populous.The Whig Party fell apart and was soon replaced with the new Republican Party dominant in the North, while the Democrats prevailed in the South. The Fugitive Slave Law helped polarize North and South, as evidenced by the enormous reaction to Harriet Beecher Stowe's novel Uncle Tom's Cabin. The passage of the Fugitive Slave Law aroused feelings of bitterness in the North. The delay of hostilities for ten years allowed the free economy of the northern states to continue to industrialize. The southern states, to a large degree based on slave labor and cash crop production, lacked the ability to do so. By 1860, the northern states had added many more miles of railroad, steel production, modern factories, and population to the advantages it possessed in 1850. The North was better able to supply, equip, and man its armed forces, an advantage that would prove decisive in the later stages of the civil war.
When Fillmore became president, he fired most of Taylor's cabinet and appointed his own, men whose views on slavery accorded more with his own. One of the controversies of the day was whether California would become a state. (Henry Clay's proposed so in a bill and it aroused violent arguments for and against extending slavery there. This led to what is known as the Compromise of 1850. Illinois Senator Stephen Douglas presented five separate bills to the Senate, bills that would
1. Admit California as a free state.
2. Settle the Texas boundary and compensate the state for lost lands.
3. Grant territorial status to New Mexico.
4. Place federal officers at the disposal of slaveholders seeking runaway slaves (The Fugitive Slave Act)
5. Abolish the slave trade, but not slavery, in the District of Columbia
Each measure obtained a majority, and, by September 20, President Fillmore had signed them into law.
The compromise of 1850 postponed civil war, but did not prevent it. In the next 10 years, the north grew more wealthy and more populous.The Whig Party fell apart and was soon replaced with the new Republican Party dominant in the North, while the Democrats prevailed in the South. The Fugitive Slave Law helped polarize North and South, as evidenced by the enormous reaction to Harriet Beecher Stowe's novel Uncle Tom's Cabin. The passage of the Fugitive Slave Law aroused feelings of bitterness in the North. The delay of hostilities for ten years allowed the free economy of the northern states to continue to industrialize. The southern states, to a large degree based on slave labor and cash crop production, lacked the ability to do so. By 1860, the northern states had added many more miles of railroad, steel production, modern factories, and population to the advantages it possessed in 1850. The North was better able to supply, equip, and man its armed forces, an advantage that would prove decisive in the later stages of the civil war.