Missouri Compromise

About the Author

There was no single author of the Missouri Compromise. Almost every U.S. senator and representative had a hand in creating it. Every senator and representative from states where slavery was legal wanted to participate in drafting the compromise in order to impress his constituents with how he was looking after their interests by blunting efforts by northern politicians to prevent the spread of slavery into new states. Although almost all of the politicians from slave states viewed the issues involved in drafting the final document as economic, most of the politicians from free states viewed the matter in terms of morality and of peacefully putting to an end the most divisive social conflicts in America. Among the most important contributors to the Missouri Compromise were Representative James Tallmadge, Senator Jesse Thomas, Representative John W. Taylor, and Speaker of the House of Representatives Henry Clay.

James Tallmadge, Jr., was born in Stanfordville, New York, on January 28, 1778. After graduating from Brown University in 1798, he studied law and was admitted to the New York bar in 1802. He commanded a company of militia during the War of 1812. He was elected as a Democratic-Republican to the House of Representatives, serving from 1817 to 1819. In February 1819 he proposed an amendment to the bill that would enable Missouri to become a state. This amendment would have eventually resulted in Missouri's becoming a free state. Tallmadge served as president of New York University from 1830 to1846. He died in New York City on September 29, 1853.

Jesse Thomas was born in Shepherdstown, Virginia (in what is now West Virginia), in 1777. He studied law in Kentucky and was the clerk for Mason County in Kentucky until 1803, when he moved to the Indiana Territory to practice law. He was the territory's delegate to Congress from October 22, 1808, to March 3, 1809, when he moved to Illinois. In 1818 he presided over the constitutional convention for Illinois, a necessary step for Illinois to become a state. He was one of the state's first two U.S. senators, serving from 1818 to 1829. It was he who was primarily responsible for the wording of Section 8 of the Missouri Compromise of 1820, which was the heart of the compromise that temporarily resolved the dispute over slavery in new states. In 1829 he moved to live in Mount Vernon, Ohio, where he committed suicide on May 2, 1853.

John W. Taylor was born in Charlton, New York, on March 26, 1784. In 1803 he graduated from Union College in Schenectady. He was admitted to the New York bar in 1807. and practiced law in Ballston Spa, New York. He served several terms in the U.S. House of Representatives and was twice elected Speaker of the House. During his time in Congress he was notably sensitive to the interests of his African American constituents and tried to have Missouri admitted to the Union as a free state. He was a Democratic-Republican who was seen by southern members of his party as dividing the party into abolitionist and proslavery camps, but he helped bring the two sides together to agree on the compromise. He lost his reelection bid in 1832 and returned to practicing law. In 1843, he moved to Cleveland, Ohio, where he died on September 18, 1854.

Henry Clay was born in Hanover County, Virginia, on April 12, 1777. He became one of America's foremost statesmen, political philosophers, and orators. In 1797 he was admitted to the state bar in Virginia after studying law at the College of William and Mary. In November 1897 he relocated to Lexington, Kentucky, to practice law. He was elected to fill a vacancy in the U.S. Senate for a few months in 1806–1807 even though he was younger than the minimum age of thirty for a senator, set by the Constitution. He served in the House of Representatives from 1808 to 1809, including as Speaker of the House in 1809. From 1810 to 1811 he again filled a vacancy in the Senate. He then served as Speaker of the House of Representatives from 1811 to 1814. He resigned in 1814 to help negotiate a peace treaty with Great Britain to end the War of 1812. From 1815 to 1821 he again served as Speaker of the House of Representatives. His participation in the drafting of the Missouri Compromise of 1820 was crucial to persuading southern congressmen to support it. From 1825 to 1829 he was secretary of state in the administration of John Quincy Adams. He ran for his party's nomination for president three times—as a Democratic-Republican in 1824, a National Republican in 1832, and a Whig in 1844—but failed each time. He served in the Senate from 1849 to his death on July 1, 1852.