why was the compromise of 1850 made?
142315
The Compromise of 1850 called The Pearce Act was a series of Congressional legislative measures addressing slavery and the boundaries of territories acquired during the Mexican-American War (1846–48). In five laws balancing the interests of the slaveholding states of the American South and the free states, California was admitted as a free state, Texas received financial compensation for relinquishing claim to lands West of the Rio Grande, the United States territory of New Mexico (including present-day Arizona and Utah) was organized without any specific prohibition of slavery, the slave trade (but not slavery itself) was abolished in Washington, D.C., and the stringent Fugitive Slave Law was passed, requiring all U.S. citizens to assist in the return of runaway slaves.\nThe measures, brokered largely by Stephen Douglas, with support from United States Senate luminaries Henry Clay, known to American history as "The Great Compromiser," and Daniel Webster, one of the United States' most famous orators, with the influence of the Fillmore Administration (and opposition of the Taylor Administration), temporarily defused sectional tensions in the United States, postponing the secession crisis and the American Civil War. However, its rejection of the Wilmot Proviso, which had banned slavery in Federal territories, in favor of the doctrine of "Popular Sovereignty" for New Mexico and Utah, was a departure from the method of addressing slavery in the territories that had been created in the Missouri Compromise in 1820. The political peace achieved by the Compromise of 1850 lasted for four years only until it was shattered by the divisive Kansas-Nebraska Act.
101340
The legislative department was composed of a Senate of from nineteen to thirty-three members and a House of Representatives of from forty-five to ninety. Representatives, elected for two years, were required to have attained the age of twenty-one. Senators were elected for four years, one-half chosen biennially, all at least thirty years old. Legislators' compensation was set at three dollars a day for each day of attendance and three dollars for each twenty-five miles of travel to and from the capital. All bills for raising revenue had to originate in the House of Representatives. Austin was made the capital until 1850, after which the people were to choose a permanent seat of government. A census was ordered for each eighth year, following which adjustment of the legislative membership was to be made. Regular sessions were biennial. Ministers of the Gospel were ineligible to be legislators. \n\nThe governor's term was two years, and he was made ineligible for more than four years in any period of six years. He was required to be a citizen and a resident of Texas for at least three years before his election and to be at least thirty years of age. He could appoint the attorney general, secretary of state, and supreme and district court judges, subject to confirmation by the Senate; but the comptroller and treasurer were elected biennially by a joint session of the legislature. The governor could convene the legislature and adjourn it in case of disagreement between the two houses and was commander-in-chief of the militia. He could grant pardons and reprieves. His veto could be overruled by two-thirds of both houses. \n\nThe judiciary consisted of a Supreme Court, district courts, and such inferior courts as the legislature might establish, the judges of the higher courts being appointed by the governor for six-year terms. The Supreme Court was made up of three judges, any two of whom constituted a quorum. Supreme and district judges could be removed by the governor on address of two-thirds of both houses of the legislature for any cause that was not sufficient ground for impeachment. A district attorney for each district was elected by joint vote of both houses, to serve for two years. County officers were elected for two years by popular vote. The sheriff was not eligible to serve more than four years of any six. Trial by jury was extended to cases in equity as well as in civil and criminal law. \n\nThe longest article of the constitution was Article VII, on General Provisions. Most of its thirty-seven sections were limitations on the legislature. One section forbade the holding of office by any citizen who had ever participated in a duel. Bank corporations were prohibited, and the legislature was forbidden to authorize individuals to issue bills, checks, promissory notes, or other paper to circulate as money. The state debt was limited to $100,000, except in case of war, insurrection, or invasion. Equal and uniform taxation was required; income and occupation taxes might be levied; each family was to be allowed an exemption of $250 on household goods. A noteworthy section made exempt from forced sale any family homestead, not to exceed 200 acres of land or city property not exceeding $2,000 in value; the owner, if a married man, could not sell or trade the homestead except with the consent of his wife. Section XIX recognized the separate ownership by married women of all real and personal property owned before marriage or acquired afterwards by gift or inheritance. Texas was a pioneer state in providing for homestead protection and for recognition of community property.
569773
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Compromise
145596
from the link below:\n\nIt was established in 1854 by a coalition of former Whigs, Northern Democrats, and Free Soilers who opposed the expansion of slavery and held a Hamiltonian vision for modernizing the nation.
637173
A group of people living by our modern laws and morality might have been able to avoid the American Civil War.  I'm not sure that the people of the day could have come up with a solution.  The South wanted to secede because what the federal government was doing was going to destroy their economy.  It did, but a successful secession would have destroyed both economies.
233613
This article is about the "Fugitive Slave Act" of 1850:\n\nhttp://www.pbs.org/wgbh/aia/part4/4p2951.html\n\nHope it helps.
34215
The North in the late 1850s had a highly developed (for the time) industrial economy.  The Southern states were primarily agrarian in makeup; they looked to the North for manufactured products of all kinds; the only large-scale industrial concern in the South at the time was the Tredegar Iron Works in Richmond, Virginia.\nMany historians think that the beginning of the end in 1859-60 was the inability to find a way to resolve the Missouri Compromise.  Keep in mind that "slavery" per se was not the issue; it was one of self-determination and states' rights.  The Compromise dictated that any new states north of Missouri would be free, while any south of Missouri could allow slavery.  When Kansas was admitted as a free state, Southerners were enraged.  Continuing agitation in the north to end slavery in the south also contributed to the general discontent in the south.  The presidential election of 1860 came down to the difference in the northern and southern concepts of states' rights.  Slavery did not become an important issue in the war until about halfway through it.  President Lincoln's primary desire was always to preserve the Union, not (at the start) to do away with slavery.
443559
I wont give you a Paragraph but I will get you started,\n\nIn the 1850's and early 1860's abolitionists who had the dream of ending slavery angered many southerners who wanted to keep their lasting traditions.  Many historians believe that the abolistionist movement in the north, along with the book "Uncle Toms Cabin" were major contributing factors to the Civil war.\n\n\nGood Luck!
218572
This is going to be just a quick summary...\nFor the most part, it was not all about slavery. The states North of the Mason-Dixon line were content with slavery in the South...the problem was the "Westward Expansion." The North wanted the new states to be free from slavery, whereas the South wanted those states to be open to slavery. There were a few compromises made years before the actual war began, however, those obviously did not work. On December 20, 1860, South Carolina announced it's leave from the Union...Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana and Texas followed. \nOn February 4th, 1861, the Confederate States of America was formed with Jefferson Davis as the president. A new constitution was drawn up. Key differences were:\n*The president and vice president were elected for six year terms whereas the North had only four years. \n*The protection of slavery in new territories was given. \n*No slave trade with Africa\n*President Davis could take a loan for $15 million for the creation of a military force of 100,000. \nPresident Davis was inaugurated February 18, 1861. \n\nPresident Lincoln for the Union said, "Physically speaking, we cannot separate. We cannot remove our respective sections from each other, nor build an impassable wall between them. A husband and wife may be divorced and go out of the presence and beyond the reach of each other, but the different parts of our country cannot do this. They cannot but remain face and face, and intercourse, either amicable or hostile, must continue between them. Is it possible, then, to make that intercourse more advantageous or more satisfactory after seperation than before? Can aliens make treaties easier than friends can make laws? Can treaties be more faithfully enforced between aliens than laws can among friends?Suppose you go to war, you cannot fight always; and when, after much loss on both sides, and no gain on either, you cease fighting, the identical old quesetions as to terms of intercourse are again upon you. In your hands, my dissatisfied fellow countrymen, and not in mine, is the momentous issue of civil war. The government will not assail you. You can have no conflict without being yourselves the aggressors. You have no oath registered in heaven to destroy the government, while I shall have the most solemn one to 'preserve, protect, and defend' it..." (Page 8)\nThe first shots of the Civil War were fired on April 12th, 1861 at Ft. Sumter, South Carolina. The fight lasted for thirty-four hours, and ended by the North surrendering. The war continued until April of 1865. \nAfter it was all said and done, most of the South was destroyed and the loss of lives on both ends, are up to this day, only an estimate (over 100,000). It is said, the number of Yanks and Rebels who died are greater than the loss of American lives in both World Wars, the Korean War, and the Vietiman War...all combined.\n\nI hope this has been helpful to you. Here are some other books to check out if you are really interested in the Civil War:\n-"After the Civil War" by John S. Blay\n-"The Life of Johnny Reb" by Bell I. Wiley\n-"The Life of Billy Yank" by Bell I. Wiley\n-"Embattled Courage" by Gerald F. Linderman\n-"The Civil War: Strange & Fascinating Facts" by Burke Davis
1152742
We had something similar passed here last decade.  We called it the LINE ITEM VETO.  It allowed the president to cross out lines of legislation passed before signing it into law.  The purpose was to stop idiot lawmakers from adding totally unrelated items to a bill (ie.  the federal government shall be responsible for determining jurisdictional boundries . > and $50 million shall be approved for pothole repair in Pittsburg)\nThe line item veto allowed the last bit to be stricken from the passed legislation and was intended to undo what has become the main gridlocking habit of the day.  pas a piece of legislation that conbines two or more unassociated things so as to make it unpalatable or to piggyback onething that outerwise would not get passed.\nWe no longer have people up in arms and perhaps this is what your bill is really about,\nIf not, your constitution should have basis to challenge this law, should it pass.
635486
In a nutshell:  While the United States was fulfilling their belief in Manifest Destiny and expanding westward, arguments arose over whether slavery should be allowed or banned in new territories.  Southern states felt that it was a question of popular sovereignty -- literally that the people should decide.  When the decision was settled by compromises reached in Congress, tempers began to really flare.  Eventually, the southern states chose to secede, citing states' rights issues.
718937
While the immediate effect of the Missouri Compromise was to continue to equality between slave and free states in the Senate (Missouri and Maine), it reserved a vast majority of the area of the Louisiana Purchase into territories where slavery would be barred by federal law, and set the precedent of the northern access of slavery being on a designated parallel. This would have tremendous consequences because of the growing paranoia of slave-holding gentry in the South.\n\nWhen the slave-holding power in the South realized the actual consequences of the agreement, there would be a growing movement to not only marginalize federal power but to then force the acceptance of slavery as an institution into the psyche of people in the North. This would be seen in the Kansas - Nebraska act, in the Fugitive Slave Law, in the Compromise of 1850, etc. Slavery would go from the "Peculiar Institution," (an odd lifestyle but far away and not our business) to a forced acceptance (people in free states are forced through their taxes and law enforcement to help maintain slavery).\n\nThe people in the North had been led to believe that the problem was solved by the Southern acceptance of the Missouri Compromise, then they found they had been lied to and the problem began to get worse.
205921
The Fugitive Slave Act was part of the Compromise of 1850 and said that if a slave from the south escaped to the north, the northern people would have to return it. People in the north didn't like this law (or slavery) so they often disobeyed it. It also caused the Underground Railroad to change its route to Canada so the escaping slaves wouldn't be returned.
716209
That is not what those two plans involved at all. The Virginia plan had two houses where representation was based on population and the New Jersey Plan had two houses with equal representation for each state. The Connecticut Compromise was that one house is based on population, the other equal.
1082537
Alexander Hamilton of New York and Virginians Thomas Jefferson and James Madison worked out a compromise that permitted southern Members to support assumption of the national dept, if northern Members did not block the effort to locate the permanent seat of government on the Potomac River. Congress had been deadlocked over the issue of funding the national dept. Most northern states wanted the federal government to assume the states' debts, while most southern states opposed assumption.
961463
The Compromise of 1850 generated positive and negative results. Its passage quieted sectional animosities for a few years (until the Kansas-Nebraska Act in 1854) and held off the Civil War for about 10 years. On the other hand, Northerners were so enraged by the provisions of the Fugitive Slave Act that it was impossible to strike future compromises.\n1California was admitted to the Union as a free state. \n2The New Mexico and Utah territories were to decide the question issue by relying on “popular sovereignty,” allowing the actual settlers to vote on the issue. \n3Texas lost the New Mexico territory, but received $10 million from the federal government for its loss. \n4The slave trade in the District of Columbia was abolished. \n5A new Fugitive Slave Act was passed.
558648
California did not exist prior to 1850.  It was 'territory.'  The US immigration policy was largely non-existent prior to 1790.  You may find Benjamin Franklin's observations noteworthy however.\nThe Close-Up foundation has a VERY good discussion of this issue.  I wrote a "Debate! Citizenship" cd-rom for McGraw a few years ago for the Patterson textbook....you may be able to get hold of THAT....it has ORIGINAL documents and primary sources that may be able to 'walk' you through the US Immigration policy.  \nAs far as California goes, their last 'attempt' was Prop 187 and the Supreme Court declared much of it unconstitutional and an overreach by the state, in violation of the federal arrangement respecting 'reserved powers' of the US Government to determine 'citizenship.'\nhope this helps.