Читать книгу American Civil War For Dummies - Keith D. Dickson - Страница 30

As settlers continued to move into new territory, Congress was forced to deal with maintaining a balance of power between the Northern and Southern states. One approach had worked fairly well since 1820 — drawing a geographical boundary line (no slaves north of 36 degrees, 30 minutes latitude — basically the border between Missouri and Arkansas) that extended to the Pacific. This was known as the Missouri Compromise line. It worked because states could enter the Union in pairs: one above and one below the line (Maine-Missouri; Arkansas-Michigan; Florida and Texas-Iowa and Wisconsin). Most of these new Northern states (except Iowa) came from territory that had outlawed slavery in 1787. Because the rich lands of the new Southern states were ideal for growing cotton and other profitable crops, slavery followed the opening of these new states, allowing for an acceptable balance of power in the Congress.

Slavery, as an issue, did not move to the forefront of the national consciousness until after the Mexican-American War. By 1850, everything had changed (see Chapter 1). Faced now with a major crisis over the balance of power, Congress made an exception to the 1820 geographical boundary by admitting California as a free state, but remained faithful to the boundary line with the disposition of New Mexico territory as a way to mollify Southern fears. Yet shortly thereafter, the future of the Kansas-Nebraska territory posed another threat. All of that territory was above the 1820 geographical boundary, and therefore, technically, non-slave territory. The South couldn’t allow that to happen unless two new slave states could also be added to balance power, which didn’t look likely to happen in the near future. The territory north of the Missouri Compromise line was attractive farmland; in contrast, the arid high desert territory south and west of Texas below the compromise line reserved for slavery had little attraction for farmers, whether they owned slaves or not. Another crisis over the political control of the future of America, far more serious than the one in 1850, was brewing.