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Introduction: A Disastrous Decade
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1 Paul Finkelman Introduction A Disastrous Decade It was aremarkableperiod,unlikeanyotherinAmericanhistory.Itwas thelongdecadeofthe1850s.Itbeganin1848 with the end of the Mexican War and the presidential election. It ended in 1860 with the election of LincolnandthesecessionofSouthCarolina.Itbeganincrisisandendedin catastrophe. The crisis was rooted in the dramatic success of American forces in the Mexican War (1846–48). The war added massive amounts of newlandtothenation—allormostofthepresent-daystatesofArizona, California, Nevada, New Mexico, and Utah—and parts of Colorado, Oklahoma , Texas, and Wyoming. This enlargement of the nation created a deeply divisive debate over the status of slavery in the new territory. Compounding thiswereextravagantclaimsofTexasformuchofNewMexico, southerndemandsforanewfugitiveslavelaw,andgrowingnortherndissatisfaction overthepresenceofslaveryinthenationalcapital.Thegold rush of 1849 exacerbated the crisis, as tens of thousands of settlers and prospectorspouredintonorthernCalifornia,makingiteligibleforstatehood almostovernight. Five presidents held oYce from 1848 to 1860. James K. Polk, the lameduck , expansionist, proslavery Tennessean, had little inXuence on the events at theendofhisadministration.HehadaggressivelystartedawarwithMexico thatledtooverwhelmingAmericanvictories.Buthewasunabletocontrol eventsleadingtopeaceandwasforcedtoacceptatreatywhenhereally wanted to continue the war to secure even more land. Meanwhile, he failed to create a political solution for the status of the newly acquired territory. His 2 Paul Finkelman successor, Zachary Taylor, was a southerner with substantial northern support and a slave owner who opposed the spread of slavery into the new territories .Asasoldierhehadcommandednorthernersandsouthernersand hadlivedsubstantialportionsofhislifeinbothsections.Astheheroofthe MexicanWarhewastheonlypresidentinthisperiodwhomighthavesolved thecrisis.Tragically,hediedjustsixteenmonthsaftertakingoYce. Each presidentfollowingTaylor—MillardFillmore,FranklinPierce,andJames Buchanan—was worse than his predecessor.1 None was able to successfully deal with the complexities that faced the nation, and all three in the end shamelesslyappeasedthemostaggressiveproslaverysouthernerswhileutterly ignoringtheinterestsandneedsoftheNorth.Congressmeanwhile passedtwomajorpiecesoflegislation—theCompromiseof1850 and the Kansas-NebraskaAct,in1854—but both only made the crisis worse. In Dred Scott v. Sandford (1857)2 the Supreme Court tried to solve all the nation’s problems inasinglestroke.ButChiefJusticeRogerB.Taney’sboldmovebackWred and his decision is considered the most notorious in our history. Justastheconstitutionallycreatedinstitutionsofgovernment—theexecutive branch,theCongress,andthecourts—failedthenation,sotoodidthe politicalparties.Bothmajorpoliticalpartiesfracturedunderthestress.The Whigswonthepresidencyin1848 but quickly squandered their victory. Henry Clay,whohaddesperatelywantedtobepresident,petulantlydideverything in his power to undermine President Taylor’s administration because he was angryatnotgettingtheWhignominationin1848.3 Ratherthanworkingwith the president of his own party to solve the crisis, Clay opposed Taylor in a vaingloriousattempttomakehimselftheheadofthepartyandthedefacto leaderofthenation.Theresultwashisproposed“omnibusbill”fordealing withslaveryintheterritoriesandotherissues,eventhoughhisownparty’s 1 Two,JamesBuchananandFranklinPierce,areconsistentlylistedasamongtheWve worst,withBuchananrankedastheworstorthesecondworst,behindAndrewJohnson. MillardFillmore’splaceintheworsttenissecure,butIwouldarguehedeservesbetter,as the fourth or Wfth worst president. See Paul Finkelman, Millard Fillmore (New York, 2011). 2 60 U.S. (19 How.) 393 (1857). The literature on Dred Scottisvast.SeegenerallyDonE. Fehrenbacher, The Dred Scott Case: Its Significance in Law and Politics (New York, 1978); Paul Finkelman, Dred Scott v. Sandford: A Brief History (Boston, 1995);andDavidThomasKonig, PaulFinkelman,andChristopherAlanBracey,eds.,The Dred Scott Case: Historical and Contemporary Perspectives on Race and Law(Athens...
