PART V.
THE EVE OF THE CIVIL WAR, 1850–1861.
CHAPTER XXIV.
the administration of taylor and fillmore, 1849–1853.
THE QUESTION OF CALIFORNIA.
390. General Conditions.—The period of controversy upon which we are about to enter, was caused by the opposing interests and feelings of the North and South on the subject of slavery. In the early history of the country, the balance of power had been kept even by the alternate admission of free and slave states. But the admission of Texas, and still more, the results of the Mexican War, enlivened the hopes of the South, while the Wilmot Proviso (§ [388]) showed that the North was fully aware of the great interests involved in the annexation of any new territory capable of supporting slavery.
391. Claims of the South.—The people of the South, especially those of South Carolina and Mississippi, which had perhaps become the most influential states in political matters, asserted that the Fugitive Slave Law, provided for by the Constitution and enacted into a statute by Congress in 1793, had not been fairly carried out by the people of the North. Southerners also charged the North with a growing tendency to misrepresent, interfere with, and overthrow the institution of slavery, which had been so carefully protected by the Constitution. They saw that the North was growing much more rapidly than the South, and that the time was not far away when the South might be outvoted in Congress, with the result that, by a change of the Constitution, slavery would perhaps be swept entirely away. The circulation of anti-slavery newspapers, especially William Lloyd Garrison’s Liberator, continued to give great offense to the South, and caused laws to be passed by the Southern states prohibiting the distribution of such journals. The feelings thus aroused were further excited by repeated efforts to secure the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia.
392. Claims of the North.—In the North, on the other hand, the feeling was constantly growing that slavery was a moral wrong and a national disgrace. While the people generally disavowed the right to interfere with the institution where it already existed, they were determined to resist legislation which would introduce it into any of the new territories. They also claimed the right to the free expression of their opinion and to the free publication of their views. It was evident that only a definite occasion was needed to bring the sections to a rupture which might precipitate a civil war. This occasion soon came.
Sutter’s Mill, California, where gold was
first discovered.—From an old print.