CHAPTER VII

THE COMPROMISE OF 1850

THE scene in the British House of Lords when the elder Pitt, enfeebled by years and by arduous labors in behalf of the great measures which he promoted, fell fainting to the floor and was carried out from the familiar scenes of his long activity to expire within a brief interval, was closely paralleled in the House of Representatives on February 21, 1848. John Quincy Adams, the sole remaining link between the Federalist régime and the turbulent period of partisan politics, entered the House and took his accustomed place. At about one o'clock, after the House had disposed of business of a trivial character the venerable statesman was seen to fall to one side over the arm of his chair. The cry was raised that Mr. Adams was dying. A member had quickly extended his arm and kept the fainting man from lurching heavily to the floor and many other tender hands proffered their assistance in making him comfortable for his last moments. Immediately, the House and Senate adjourned and the insensible form, borne by fellow members of the House, was laid upon a sofa in the rotunda. Carried to the door of the east portico in order that he might be revived by the air, the venerable statesman partially recovered consciousness and whispered: "This is the last of earth. I am content." Throughout the day and through the 22d he lingered, and early in the evening

of the 23d he expired in the Speaker's room. The whole country sought to do him honor and nowhere did orators enter more heartily into their great theme than did those of the South. The man who was unpliable in his attitude toward slavery, whose Puritan principles forbade him to compromise upon the subject of freedom, the man whose keen satire, rugged oratory and bitter and exasperating taunts had often stirred the South to bitter feeling commanded the respect of the South as no quibbler with his convictions ever could have done. Replete with public honors, spotless in his private character, combining courage with consistency, John Quincy Adams had offered to his country more than fifty years of service.

Almost at the moment of Adams's seizure a confidential message from the president, transmitting the treaty with Mexico, was carried to the doors of the Senate. The hasty adjournment of that body prevented its reception until the reconvening of the Senate. For more than a fortnight

the Senate debated and considered in committees the conditions of peace. After being amended so as to accord to Mexicans the right to assume American citizenship the treaty, with other slight modifications, was adopted; its ratification, on March 10th, being by more than the required two-thirds vote. Polk, anxious that the formalities should be early completed, returned the treaty to Mexico with little delay in the last days of May. The exchange of ratifications took place at Queretaro and on July 4, 1848, the people were apprised by a proclamation of the president that peace was finally consummated. By the terms of the treaty the largest limits claimed by Texas were conceded by the Mexican government, and New Mexico and California were annexed to the national domain. The vast addition to the territory of the country represented by New Mexico, Upper California and Texas was surpassed only by the acquisition of 1803.

Attorney-General Clifford remained in Mexico as plenipotentiary and Isaac Toucey, of Connecticut, filled his

place in the Cabinet. On July 6th, the president sent a message to Congress that stimulated it to take account of the new conditions brought about by the war and to adjust the nation's policy to them. The president passed under review the recent war in its practical results. He added conciliatory sentiments with regard to the newly acquired territory in its relation to sectional questions. In this connection he said: "In organizing governments over these territories, fraught with such vast advantages to every portion of our Union, I invoke that spirit of concession, conciliation, and compromise in your deliberations, in which the Constitution was framed, in which it should be administered, and which is so indispensable to preserve and perpetuate the harmony and union of the States. We should never forget that this union of confederated States was established and cemented by kindred blood and by the common toils, sufferings, dangers, and triumphs of all its parts, and has been the ever-augmenting source of our national greatness and of all our blessings.'

The country was confronted with the cost of the war. And yet that price could not at that time be fully estimated. Subsequent figures have placed it at one hundred and sixtysix million dollars. The public debt had advanced forty-eight million dollars since Polk had entered office. It was now sixty-six million, an amount to which twelve million would have to be added in order to make up the fifteen million of the purchase price of the territory relinquished by Mexico. But the cost of the new territory was not the only problem which the acquisition brought to its purchasers. Immediately, the contest between the slave and free sections of the Union was precipitated. It was impossible that the claims of such discordant elements as the advocates of freedom and the friends of slavery should peaceably adjust their conflicting claims. President Polk foresaw the epoch of strife, and in the message to which we have referred made an appeal to the patriotism of the country for the suppression of sectional feeling: "There has, perhaps," said he,

"been no period, since the warning so impressively given to his countrymen by Washington to guard against geographical divisions and sectional parties, which appeals with greater force than the present, to the patriotic, sober minded, and reflecting of all parties and of all sections of our country. Who can calculate the value of our glorious Union? It is a model and example of free government to all the world and is the star of hope and haven of rest to the oppressed of every clime. By its preservation we have been rapidly advanced, as a nation, to a height of strength, power, and happiness without a parallel in the history of the world. As we extend its blessings over new regions, shall we be so unwise as to endanger its existence by geographical divisions and dissensions?" If the president's language was to be given the only construction of which it was susceptible, it meant that the Missouri Compromise line should be carried on to the Pacific Ocean. This idea was not a new contribution to the political thought of the day; others besides Polk had proposed the same thing. Among these was Buchanan, who, in a letter written August 25, 1847, directly favored the extension of the Missouri Compromise line.

It was one thing for Polk to recommend harmony; it was another thing to bring about his pacific recommendations. A divided Congress was not amenable to such counsels. There were operating in the country principles which were fundamental in human rights and no amount of cutting and piecing of territory could prevent the irruptive forces set in motion by those principles from upheaving the disputed territory and leaving as its eternal mark the rugged lines of an angry cleavage. The nation that at its birth had been fondled to the breast of .freedom and which in its early manhood had gone out upon the seas to contest with the greatest naval power of the world the freedom of the ocean paths had by its own history made it impossible that it should compromise the very principle of its existence. Black or white, the spirit of freedom claimed all the children of 'the New World. Amid the rejoicing of the country at the

splendid step that laved the nation's foot in the soft waters of the Pacific there was a latent excitement over the domestic consequences of that step.

To the demand of the North that the new territory should not admit slavery, the South made response by drawing together the Whigs and the Democrats into a party of the opposition. The spirit of compromise had come to dominate the sentiments of the South. It was impossible for that section not to feel that moral as well as territorial considerations could be equated. Nor had the South grown accustomed to look for active and forceful opposition from the North; always agitating and always aggressive, the South kept the North timid by the strength of its challenge. At last, it had come to believe that the "self-centred" and "money-making" Northerners could not be brought to fight for the fine sentiments which their abolitionist exponents expressed by word and pen. Cotton had given to the South its commission to enthrall and to keep in bondage the negro, and had placed in the hands of the people the moral code by which they were governed. As ex-President Tyler declared in 1850: "The monopoly of the cotton plant was the great and important concern. That monopoly now secured, places all other nations at our feet."

The president's recommendations passed unheeded by Congress. The presidential canvass was in progress, and the time was regarded as ill suited for the agitation of a question which was bound to bring out sectional differences. Nevertheless, the Whig House took one significant step at this time. Both parties were agreed that it was time for Oregon to be organized into a territory. There were some who hoped that the bill for that purpose might also include California and New Mexico. On August 2d a bill relating solely to Oregon was introduced, and to it was attached the Wilmot Proviso, a section of which extended the Ordinance of 1787 embodying anti-slavery provision over the whole territory. The House voted down that amendment, and the Senate, which had passed the measure, concurred in