Compromise of 1850

​By 1850, the U.S. had completed manifest destiny as it stretched from coast to coast. Disagreements about expanding slavery west were breaking the bonds of unity and increasing tension between the North and South. These tensions became especially serious when Congress began to consider whether western lands acquired after the U.S.–Mexican War would allow slavery. (Should slavery be allowed in the newly acquired western land?)

1. What was the cause of tension between the North and South?

Due to the Gold Rush in 1849, California's population soared and they requested permission to enter the Union as a free state. Adding California as a free state would destroy the balance between slave and free states that had existed since the Missouri Compromise of 1820. Since everyone looked to the Senate to defuse the growing crisis, Senator Henry Clay proposed a series of resolutions designed to solve the controversy regarding slavery beginning with adding California as a free state. 

Henry Clay's resolutions in the Compromise of 1850 were as follows:

• California enters the Union as a FREE state

• Southwest U.S. can vote on slavery

• Slave trade abolished (outlawed) in Washington D.C.

• People with slaves in Washington D.C. could keep them

• Fugitive Slave Law made stronger

With the help of Henry Clay, Congress had solved the immediate crisis of slavery with the Compromise of 1850. But one part of the compromise—a new and improved Fugitive Slave Law—began to haunt the lives of many African Americans and northerners as well.

2. Who created, is responsible for, the Compromise of 1850?