Comp Of 1850 Essay, Research Paper

The Compromise of 1850

The Compromise of 1850 was a series of five legislative enactment’s, passed by

the US Congress during August and September 1850. These measures were designed

to reconcile the political differences then dividing the antislavery and proslavery

factions of Congress and the nation. The measures dealt chiefly with the question of

whether slavery was to be sanctioned or prohibited in the regions acquired from Mexico

as a result of the Mexican War. The Compromise was clearly better for the North than the South.

The Compromise of 1850 consisted of laws admitting California as a free state,

creating Utah and New Mexico territories with the question of slavery in each to be

determined by popular sovereignty, settling a Texas-New Mexico boundary dispute in

the former’s favor, ending the slave trade in Washington, DC, and making it easier for

southerners to recover fugitive slaves.

At the close of the Mexican War, in 1848, the United States owned vast

stretches of territory without local government. All the land now included in New

Mexico, Arizona, and California was then unsettled. In 1848, gold was discovered in

California. Thousands of people, mostly from the Northern states, joined the gold rush.

In a few months 80,000 had settled in the mining region. To maintain order in these

settlements, an established government was needed. California asked to be admitted

to the Union as a “flee state”–one which would not permit slavery. The United States,