Compromises That Lead to the Constitution

Tension had already been building up in the states about slavery. It reached a highpoint when Missouri asked to be admitted into the Union in 1819, as a slave state. This would upset the balance of an equal amount of slave states and free states. At the time, the U.S. contained 11 free states and 11 slave states. So they decided to make a compromise. The Missouri Compromise admitted Missouri a slave state and Maine as a free state to maintain the balance. Also slavery was to be excluded from the Louisiana Purchase lands north of latitude 36°30’, excluding Missouri. This Compromise had some pros and cons.

The Missouri Compromise was a sequence of controversial agreements that was created in 1820 with the purpose of diffusing the volatile atmosphere which had swept through the United States. The focal point of this situation centered around the territory of Missouri, who had finally appealed to enter the Union as a slave state. However, during this time period of American history, there were exactly eleven free states and eleven slave states in the Union. Realizing that the addition of Missouri would throw the fragile balance of the divided country into chaos, Congress proposed the Missouri Compromise in an effort to maintain the status quo. The terms of the first Compromise stated that Maine was to be admitted as a free state, while Missouri

Document 6, talks about the Missouri Compromise dividing Free states from slaves states. It also shows fear of a permanent disunions and that every argument will make the separation much deeper and everlasting. The Missouri compromise was passed in 1820 between the pro-slavery and anti-slavery factions. It involved the regulation of slavery in the western territories. The main problem was that the north and south had different moral and political views on

Following the Louisiana Purchase, Congress wanted to create a policy to guide the expansion of slavery into the new western territory. Missouri’s application for statehood as a slave state sparked bitter debate. Pro-slavery legislators from Missouri would give the pro-slavery faction a congressional majority. They compromised by agreeing that Missouri would be a slave state, but Maine would be admitted as a free state. This is one of the many different conflicts that happened between the North and the South. The North wanted to abolish slavery, while the South depended on slavery. This many arguments caused disunity between the two and eventually lead to the Civil

The events that led to the time where compromise no longer seemed possible, starting the American Civil War, involved intense augmentation of sectionalism, dispute of states’ over federal rights, and the dispute of slavery. The North and the South’s differentiation in

What were the compromises in the Constitutional Convention In 1787, 55 delegates met to revise the Articles of Confederation. They ended up writing one of the most documents in the history of the United States. Each delegate had a set of ideals, or beliefs for the 3 main issues. This created many tensions in the three ideas, and a compromise was needed.

In 1820 Missouri wanted to join the Union as a slave state. Since it would ruin the balance between Slave states and Free states in the Senate, Henry Clay came up with the Missouri compromise. What it did was make Missouri a Slave state and Maine a free state. “This law prohibited slavery in the Louisiana Territory north of the 36° 30´ latitude line.”(Bibliography source #2) It also allowed the owners to recapture runaway slaves that fled to the North, like wanted posters describing them and how much for the reward. “Runaway from the subscriber, on the night of Thursday, the 30th of September” (Bibliography#3) They limited themselves by only applying the Compromise to the states gained in the Louisiana Purchase, this than led to the fighting after the Mexican war when America gained new territories in the West. This ruined the Missouri Compromise. Historians believe that if the Compromise had been applied to all

In 1819, two more states wishing to join the union, were Missouri and Maine. Missouri wanted to join the union in the in the north, but as a slave state. this would make the balance of power in congress unequal. Many northerners opposed this idea. Northerners proposed that Missouri be a slave state and that no more slaves were to be brought in, and all slave children would be free at age 25. Eventually Missouri would be a free state. Southerners were opposed to this idea. Congress debated for months. This brought about the Missouri Compromise of 1820, when Henry Clay proposed that Maine enter the union as a free state. He also proposed prohibiting slavery above the 36’30’ latitude, which is the southern boundary of Missouri. Since plantations would not be able to survive further north of this line, the South agreed.

Representative James Tallmadge of New York introduced an amendment to the Missouri statehood bill that would have 1) prohibited the further introduction of slaves into Missouri and 2) would have freed at the age of 25 all children of slaves born in Missouri after its admission of statehood. Sharp angry debate over the rights of Congress to legislate on the slavery issue ensued. It was the first time the issue of whether or not slavery was good for the United States was discussed in Congress. It became apparent in the debate that the balance of Free State representation and slave state representation in the Senate would be critical in other debates. The Free states already had more voted in the House. With the Tallmadge Amendment, the South feared that the prohibition of slavery by Congress in Missouri would set a precedent to eventually lead to the absolute prohibition of slavery in the United States. The Tallmadge Amendment passed the House but was deadlocked in the Senate. The first break in the debate towards a solution began in 1820 when Maine applied for statehood. The essential provisions of the Missouri Compromise provided: 1) that Missouri be admitted as a slave state and Maine be admitted as a free state and 2) that the territory north of the 36’30° (Missouri’s southern border) be “forever free.” This permitted new states admitted south of this line to become slave states. This appeared to be a settlement to the debate until Missouri admitted a constitution

The Missouri Compromise was a temporary solution to the issue of slavery and territorial rights such as the movement West. Two areas of land wanted to become states in 1820, known as Maine and Missouri. Maine wanted to enter as a free state with no slavery as everyone in that area was against it and wanted it abolished. Missouri wanted to enter as a slave state and was all for slavery and wanted it to be spread all throughout the country. The compromise everyone came into conclusion with, was that there would be no slavery allowed north of 36° 30’ latitude. This angered the Southerners because their intention was to promote slavery not have it abolished. They realized that this compromise threatened the balance between free and slave states; Maine and Missouri. In order to expand slavery, the South felt that the United States would need territory from Mexico. The only area of land left was in Arkansas and that line became known as the Missouri Compromise line. The impact that the Missouri Compromise had on the United States was tremendous and had many effects on issues such as national politics, the institution of slavery, and the overall togetherness of the nation as a whole.

During the years leading up to the civil war, the issue of slavery was the main focus of most politicians. The people in the North were anti-slavery and wanted slavery to be gone forever. The people in the South, some who owned slaves, thought that slavery was a okay and that it should be legal. One of the first laws passed that had to do with slavery was the Missouri Compromise in 1820. In early 1819, Missouri applied to become a state of the union. At this time, there were 11 states that allowed slavery and 11 that did not. This balance was crucial because it meant that there was equal representation in congress for both sides. But Missouri would become a slave state, tipping the balance in favor of the South. To address

At first the Missouri Compromise worked out well, but white slave owners were unpleased that Congress had given itself the right to control slave laws. Northerners weren’t happy either. They were upset about Congress letting slavery spread through the states.

Southerners believes that if the United States could forbid slavery in Missouri, they could do so elsewhere. It 1820 congress finally agreed that slavery would be allowed in Missouri, but at the same time Maine would be carved out and admitted to the union as a free state. They also agreed that as the United States Expanded westward, states north of the 36 and a half degrees North would be free states, while states south of that would be slave states. This angered the north because under the compromise the new slave states covered more land than that of the new free states. Northerners worried that another slave state might increase the power of the southern states in the government.

This amendment is known as the Tallmadge Amendment. This bill stated that no slaves could be brought into the state of Missouri and slaves born there would be freed at the age of 25. Southerners were bothered by this suggested law because they felt that it would threaten the sectional balance we had in our country and that Congress would attempt to abolish slavery in southern states. As a solution to this growing dilemma, Henry Clay proposed the Missouri compromise in 1820. This compromise, commonly known as “The Great Compromise”, stated three important things. One being that Missouri was to be admitted as a slaveholding state. Second, Maine was to be admitted as a free state, in order to keep the balance. Third, in the rest of the Louisiana territory north of latitude 36º 30' , slavery was prohibited. Although this compromise was accepted by both sides of the country, it upset many Northerners, thus increasing growing sectionalism in our nation. Nevertheless, the “Era of Good feelings” was badly damaged by Americans’ torn feelings of sectional controversy over Missouri (North vs. South).

At the time, the United States contained twenty-two states, evenly divided between slave and free. In the years leading up to the Missouri Compromise of 1820, tensions began to rise between proslavery and antislavery factions within the U.S. Congress and across the country. They reached a boiling point after Missouri’s 1819 request for admission to the Union as a slave state, which threatened to upset the delicate balance between slave states and free states. To keep the peace, Congress came up with a two-part compromise, granting Missouri’s request but also admitting Maine as a free state. It also passed an amendment that drew an imaginary line across the former Louisiana Territory, establishing a boundary between free and slave regions that remained the law of the land until it was repealed by the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854.