Blackwell Reference Online

Extract

When Mo, requested admission as a slave state, the House voted in February 1819 that statehood be delayed until it voted to end slavery by a definite date, but the Senate rejected this condition. The issue alarmed the South since representatives of slave states were a minority in the House, but composed half the Senate; if slave territories were denied statehood, then southern interests would be outvoted in both houses. Congress compromised on 2 March 1820 by (1) admitting Mo, as a slave state simultaneously with Maine as a free state, and (2) banning slavery in any territory organized north of a line drawn west from the Mo-Ark. border. This measure began the practice of preserving the Senate's equal balance by admitting a slave and a free territory to statehood together. The K ansas -N ebraska A ct repealed its ban on slavery north of 36°30′, and D red S cott v. S andford ruled it unconstitutional. ... log in or subscribe to read full text