The
Crittenden Compromise (December 18, 1860) was an unsuccessful proposal by
KentuckyThe Commonwealth of Kentucky is a state located in the East Central United States of America. Kentucky is a Southern state situated in the Upland South, although the state is infrequently placed, geographically and culturally, in the Midwest. Kentucky is one of four U.S. states constituted as a...
Senator
John J. CrittendenJohn Jordan Crittenden was an American statesman from Kentucky. He twice served as United States Attorney General. He represented Kentucky in both houses of Congress and served as the state's seventeenth governor....
to resolve the U.S. secession crisis of 1860–1861 by addressing the concerns that led the states in the
Deep SouthThe Deep South is a descriptive category of the cultural and geographic subregions in the American South. Historically, it is differentiated from the "Upper South" as being the states which were most dependent on plantation type agriculture during the antebellum period...
of the
United StatesThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
to contemplate
secessionSecession is the act of withdrawing from an organization, union, or especially a political entity.-Secession theory:...
from the United States.
The compromise consisted of a preamble, six proposed
constitutionalThe Constitution of the United States of America is the supreme law of the United States. It is the foundation and source of the legal authority underlying the existence of the United States of America and the federal government of the United States...
amendments and four proposed Congressional resolutions.
The
Crittenden Compromise (December 18, 1860) was an unsuccessful proposal by
KentuckyThe Commonwealth of Kentucky is a state located in the East Central United States of America. Kentucky is a Southern state situated in the Upland South, although the state is infrequently placed, geographically and culturally, in the Midwest. Kentucky is one of four U.S. states constituted as a...
Senator
John J. CrittendenJohn Jordan Crittenden was an American statesman from Kentucky. He twice served as United States Attorney General. He represented Kentucky in both houses of Congress and served as the state's seventeenth governor....
to resolve the U.S. secession crisis of 1860–1861 by addressing the concerns that led the states in the
Deep SouthThe Deep South is a descriptive category of the cultural and geographic subregions in the American South. Historically, it is differentiated from the "Upper South" as being the states which were most dependent on plantation type agriculture during the antebellum period...
of the
United StatesThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
to contemplate
secessionSecession is the act of withdrawing from an organization, union, or especially a political entity.-Secession theory:...
from the United States.
Background
The compromise consisted of a preamble, six proposed
constitutionalThe Constitution of the United States of America is the supreme law of the United States. It is the foundation and source of the legal authority underlying the existence of the United States of America and the federal government of the United States...
amendments and four proposed Congressional resolutions. Both the
House of RepresentativesThe United States House of Representatives, commonly referred to as the "House," is the lower house of the bicameral United States Congress, the upper house being the United States Senate. The composition and powers of the House and the Senate are established in Article One of the Constitution...
and the
SenateThe United States Senate is the upper house of the bicameral United States Congress, the lower house being the House of Representatives. The composition and powers of the Senate and the House are established in Article One of the U.S. Constitution . Each U.S state is represented by two senators,...
rejected it in 1861. It was widely perceived as making heavy concessions to the South, but perhaps the most significant aspect of it was
Abraham LincolnAbraham Lincoln was the 16th President of the United States, serving from March 1861 until his assassination in April 1865. He successfully led his country through its greatest internal crisis, the American Civil War, preserving the Union and ending slavery...
's immediate rejection, because he was elected on a platform that opposed the expansion of slavery. The South's reaction to his rejection paved the way for the
American Civil WarThe American Civil War , also known as the War Between the States and several other names, was a civil war in the United States of America. Eleven Southern slave states declared their secession from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America...
.
There were many unpopular features of the compromise that led to its failure. It guaranteed the permanent existence of slavery in the slave states and addressed Southern demands in regard to fugitive slaves and slavery in the District of Columbia. But the heart of the compromise was the permanent reestablishment of the
Missouri CompromiseThe Missouri Compromise was an agreement passed in 1820 between the pro-slavery and anti-slavery factions in the United States Congress, involving primarily the regulation of slavery in the western territories. It prohibited slavery in the former Louisiana Territory north of the parallel 36°30'...
line: slavery would be prohibited north of the 36° 30′ parallel and guaranteed south of it. The compromise, furthermore, included a clause that it could not be repealed or amended.
The compromise was popular among Southern delegates in the Senate, but it was generally unacceptable to the Republicans (
free soilersThe Free Soil Party was a short-lived political party in the United States active in the 1848 and 1852 presidential elections, and in some state elections. It was a third party that largely appealed to and drew its greatest strength from New York State. The party leadership consisted of former...
) who believed that slavery must not be allowed to expand. One of these Republicans was Abraham Lincoln, who condemned the compromise as one that did not deal with the future of slavery in America. Republicans declared that if the compromise were accepted, it "would amount to a perpetual covenant of war against every people, tribe, and state owning a foot of land between here and
Tierra del FuegoTierra del Fuego or TF is an archipelago off the southernmost tip of the South American mainland, across the Strait of Magellan. The southern point of the archipelago forms Cape Horn.- History :...
."
At the time the only territories south of the line were parts of
New Mexico TerritoryThe Territory of New Mexico was an organized incorporated territory of the United States that existed from September 9, 1850, until January 6, 1912, when the final extent of the territory was admitted to the Union as the State of New Mexico....
and
Indian TerritoryThe Indian Territory, also known as the Indian Territories and the Indian Country, was land set aside within the United States for the use of Native Americans...
; there was considerable agreement on both sides that slavery would never flourish in New Mexico, and in fact the South refused House Republicans' proposal approved by committee on December 29 to admit New Mexico as a state immediately.
The full text of the compromise was introduced on December 18 and printed in the
Congressional Globe on the same day. It was tabled on December 31. The proposals were discussed in February 1861 at the
peace conferenceThe Peace Conference of 1861 was a meeting of more than 100 of the leading politicians of the antebellum United States held in Washington, D.C., in February 1861 in a last-ditch effort to avert what became the Civil War. The success of President Abraham Lincoln and the Republican Party in the...
, the final formal effort to avert the start of war.
Amendments to the Constitution
- Slavery would be prohibited in any territory of the United States "now held, or hereafter acquired," north of latitude 36 degrees, 30 minutes
The parallel 36°30' north is a circle of latitude that is 36.5 degrees north of the Earth's equatorial plane, and is particularly significant in the history of the United States as the line of the Missouri Compromise.-Geography:...
line. In territories south of this line, slavery was "hereby recognized" and could not be interfered with by Congress. Furthermore, property in slaves was to be "protected by all the departments of the territorial government during its continuance." States would be admitted to the Union from any territory with or without slavery as their constitutions provided.
- Congress was forbidden to abolish slavery in places under its jurisdiction within a slave state such as a military post.
- Congress could not abolish slavery in the District of Columbia so long as it existed in the adjoining states of Virginia and Maryland and without the consent of the District's inhabitants. Compensation would be given to owners who refused consent to abolition.
- Congress could not but prohibit or interfere with the interstate slave trade.
- Congress would provide full compensation to owners of rescued fugitive slaves. Congress was empowered to sue the county in which obstruction to the fugitive slave laws took place to recover payment; the county, in turn, could sue "the wrong doers or rescuers" who prevented the return of the fugitive.
- No future amendment of the Constitution could change these amendments or authorize or empower Congress to interfere with slavery within any slave state.
Fugitive Slave Laws
- That fugitive slave laws
The fugitive slave laws were laws passed by the United States Congress in 1793 and 1850 to provide for the return of slaves who escaped from one state into another or into a public territory.-Colonial era:...
were constitutional and should be faithfully observed and executed.
- That all state laws which impeded the operation of fugitive slave laws, the so-called "Personal liberty laws
The personal liberty laws were a series of laws passed by several U.S. states in the North in response to the Fugitive Slave Act of 1793 and 1850.-Origins:...
," were unconstitutional and should be repealed.
- That the Fugitive Slave Law of 1850
The Fugitive Slave Law or Fugitive Slave Act was passed by the United States Congress on September 18, 1850, as part of the Compromise of 1850 between Southern slaveholding interests and Northern Free-Soilers. This was one of the most controversial acts of the 1850 compromise and heightened...
should be modified [and rendered less objectionable to the North] by equalizing the fee schedule for returning or releasing alleged fugitives and limiting the powers of marshals to summon citizens to aid in their capture.
- That laws for the suppression of the African slave trade
The slave trade in Africa existed for thousands of years. The first main route passed through the Sahara, tying in to the Arab slave trade. After the European Age of Exploration, African slaves became part of the Atlantic slave trade, from which comes the modern, Western conception of slavery as...
should be effectively and thoroughly executed.