8.9.4

Discuss the importance of the slavery issue as raised by the annexation of Texas and California's admission to the union as a free state under the Compromise of 1850.
             Antislavery, the opposition to involuntary servitude and the slave trade because of American principles, was greatly affected by the admission of Texas and California into the Union. The annexation of Texas into the United States had long been a question. Congress did not approve of the addition of the new state, but some thought that the British would take Texas if it was left as an independent nation. Texas was thought by many as a state in which “Moral principle is divorced from politics--partyism has devoured patriotism.” Texas was ruled by an oligarchy at the time. The addition of Texas would also unbalance the power in the Senate, thus bringing about the issue on hand: slavery. John Quincy Adams blocked the annexation of Texas for 22 days by staging a filibuster, or a delay in legislation. Proslavery southerners began spreading rumors that the British would annex Texas if the United States did not, and turn it into a safe haven for runaway slaves. Britain was, in fact, trying to slow the spread of the slave trade by persuading Texas to outlaw slavery for British foreign aid. The Americans, for fear of British expansion, annexed Texas into the Union – as a slave state. Proslavery Texans would later have an effect on another new state, California.
             When gold was discovered in California, thousands flocked to the soon-to-be state from all over the United States. Some, however, brought their slaves with them. A group of Texan miners used slave labor to mine for gold. The white miners, however, felt it was unfair to have to compete with slaves. The white miners held a convention and unanimously decided that “neither slavery nor involuntary servitude” would be allowed in California. California later applied for admission into the Union in 1849, but there was still the issue of slavery. If California was admitted as a free state, the number of slave states would be less than the number of free states, unbalancing the power in Congress. However, antislavery was already spreading through much of the United States, and slavery would not make as much profit in the Californian climate and geography as it did in the South. Senator Henry Clay proposed that California would be a free state, but, New Mexico and Utah would have no slavery restrictions, to satisfy the proslavery South. Clay’s proposal also included a strong federal law for the return of fugitive slaves. The Compromise of 1850 was met very close to Clay’s proposal, and California became a free state. The question of slavery in New Mexico and Utah would be left up to the state legislatures. Thus, slavery did not progress into the west but still claimed some of the Midwest, and antislavery still remained, later causing a Civil War.

David Atkinson, in a letter revealing the uncertainty of the Compromise Calhoun is dead, therefore his want of popularity will be no longer in our way. Our old friend Genl. [Lewis] Cass has been released from his instructions to vote for the Wilmot proviso; indeed that proposition I think is dead. What kind of settlement of the slavery question will be made I can not tell. But California will be admitted as a state, governments for the territories without the proviso, a fugitive Slave Bill, etc.


More Information:

   1.    http://www.gliah.uh.edu/documents/searchdisplay.cfm?ID=96
          John Quincy Adams opposes the annexation of Texas. Describes both the proslavery and antislavery sides of the Annexation issue, along with an excerpt from one of Adams’ speeches.

   2.    http://www.gliah.uh.edu/database/subtitles.cfm?titleID=58
          An online textbook! Read the first five sections for information relating to California’s slavery issue and the Compromise of 1850.

   3.    http://www2.worldbook.com/features/aajourney/html/bh003.html
          A history of American slavery. Includes the period in question (the annexation of Texas and California).

   4.    http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/aia/part4/4p2951.html
          A page featuring the Compromise of 1850. Explains the effects and controversies of the law.


Recommended Books:

   1.    Texas, New Mexico, and the Compromise of 1850: Boundary Dispute & Sectional Crisis
          by Mark J. Stegmaier

   2.    Texas and the Mexican War: a Chronicle of the Winning of the Southwest
          by Nathaniel W. Stephenson

   3.    Slavery and the American West: The Eclipse of Manifest Destiny and the Coming of the Civil War
          by Michael A. Morrison

   4.    The Abolitionists: A collection of their writings
          by Louis Ruchames

   5.    Slavery Defended: the views of the old South
          by Eric L. McKitrick

   6.    Slavery in the 19th Century
          by Pearson and Robertson.