Missouri Compromise

Questions for Further Study

• 1. Why did many representatives of slave states view the Missouri Compromise as a victory?
• 2. Were those who predicted that the Missouri Compromise was a prelude to civil war correct? Explain your answer.
• 3. You are a justice of the Supreme Court deciding the constitutionality of the Missouri Compromise. Was it constitutional or not? Give reasons for your opinion.
• 4. Why did Thomas Jefferson and John Quincy Adams believe that the debate over the Missouri Compromise had made civil war more likely than before?
• 5. Jefferson and many other political philosophers in the early decades of the United States believed that slavery would fade away. Did passage of the Missouri Compromise make this possibility more likely or less so? Explain your answer.