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The Crittenden Compromise
The Crittenden Compromise was a last-ditch attempt to solve the slavery
question peacefully. In December of 1860, Senator John J. Crittenden of
Kentucky, backed by the National Union Party, introduced a proposal to
Congress which would have confirmed the free-and-slave state boundary set by
the Missouri Compromise, allowed slave trading in the District of Columbia
to continue, prohibited the importation of slaves from Africa, and slightly
modified the Fugitive Slave Law.
The proposed compromise was supported by the border states and acceptable to the South, but Lincoln and the Republican party opposed it. The Crittenden
Compromise was defeated in both the House and Senate.
The Compromise, as offered on December 18, 1860, consisted of a preamble,
six (proposed) constitutional amendments, and four (proposed) Congressional
resolutions.
A joint resolution (S. No. 50) proposing certain amendments to the
Constitution of the United States.
Whereas serious and alarming dissensions have arisen between the northern
and southern states, concerning the rights and security of the rights of the
slaveholding States, and especially their rights in the common territory of
the United States; and whereas it is eminently desirable and proper that
these dissensions, which now threaten the very existence of this Union,
should be permanently quieted and settled by constitutional provisions,
which shall do equal justice to all sections, and thereby restore to all the
people that peace and good-will which ought to prevail between all the
citizens of the United States: Therefore,
Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of
America in Congress assembled, (two thirds of both Houses concurring,) That
the following articles be, and are hereby, proposed and submitted as
amendments to the Constitution of the United States, which shall be valid to
all intents and purposes, as part of said Constitution, when ratified by
conventions of three-fourths of the several States:
Article 1: In all the territory of the United States now held, or
hereafter acquired, situate north of 36 degrees 30 minutes, slavery or
involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime, is prohibited while
such territory shall remain under territorial government. In all the
territory south of said line of latitude, slavery of the African race is
hereby recognized as existing, and shall not be interfered with by Congress,
but shall be protected as property by all the departments of the territorial
government during its continuance. And when any territory, north or south of
said line, within such boundaries as Congress may prescribe, shall contain
the population requisite for a member of Congress according to the then
Federal ratio of representation of the people of the United States, it shall,
if its form of government be republican, be admitted into the Union, on an
equal footing with the original States, with or without slavery, as the
constitution of such new State may provide.
Article 2: Congress shall have no power to abolish slavery in places under
its exclusive jurisdiction, and situate within the limits of States that permit the holding of slaves.
Article 3: Congress shall have no power to abolish slavery within the
District of Columbia, so long as it exists in the adjoining States of
Virginia and Maryland, or either, nor without the consent of the
inhabitants, nor without just compensation first made to such owners of
slaves as do not consent to such abolishment. Nor shall Congress at any time
prohibit officers of the Federal Government, or members of Congress, whose
duties require them to be in said District, from bringing with them their
slaves, and holding them as such during the time their duties may require
them to remain there, and afterwards taking them from the District.
Article 4: Congress shall have no power to prohibit or hinder the
transportation of slaves from one State to another, or to a Territory, in
which slaves are by law permitted to be held, whether that transportation be
by land, navigable river, or by the sea.
Article 5: That in addition to the provisions of the third paragraph of
the second section of the fourth article of the Constitution of the United
States, Congress shall have power to provide by law, and it shall be its
duty so to provide, that the United States shall pay to the owner who shall
apply for it, the full value of his fugitive slave in all cases where the
marshall or other officer whose duty it was to arrest said fugitive was
prevented from so doing by violence or intimidation, or when, after arrest,
said fugitive was rescued by force, and the owner thereby prevented and
obstructed in the pursuit of his remedy for the recovery of his fugitive
slave under the said clause of the Constitution and the laws made in
pursuance thereof. And in all such cases, when the United States shall pay
for such fugitive, they shall have the right, in their own name, to sue the
county in which said violence, intimidation, or rescue was committed, and to
recover from it, with interest and damages, the amount paid by them for said
fugitive slave. And the said county, after it has paid said amount to the
United States, may, for its indemnity, sue and recover from the wrong-doers
or rescuers by whom the owner was prevented from the recovery of his
fugitive slave, in like manner as the owner himslef might have sued and
recovered.
Article 6: No future amendment of the Constitution shall affect the five
preceding articles; nor the third paragraph of the second section of the
first article of the Constitution; nor the third paragraph of the second
section of the fourth article of said Constitution; and no amendment will be
made to the Constitution which shall authorize or give to Congress any power
to abolish or interfere with slavery in any of the States by whose laws it
is, or may be, allowed or permitted.
And whereas, also, besides those causes of dissension embraced in the
foregoing amendments proposed to the Constitution of the United States,
there are others which come within the jurisdiction of Congress, and may be
remedied by its legislative power; and whereas it is the desire of Congress,
so far as its power will extend, to remove all just cause for the popular
discontent and agitation which now disturb the peace of the country, and
threaten the stability of its institutions; Therefore,
1. Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States
of America, in Congress assembled, That the laws now in force for the
recovery of fugitive slaves are in strict pursuance of the plain and
mandatory provisions of the Constitution, and have been sanctioned as valid
and constitutional by the judgement of the Supreme Court of the United
States.; that the slaveholding States are entitled to the faithful
observance and execution of those laws, and that they ought not to be
repealed, or so modified or changed as to impair their efficiency; and that
laws ought to be made for the punishment of those who attempt by rescue of
the slave, or other illegal means, to hinder or defeat the due execution of
said laws.
2. That all State laws which conflict with the fugitive slave acts of
Congress, or any other constitutional acts of Congress, or which, in their
operation, impede, hinder, or delay the free course and due execution of any
of said acts, are null and void by the plain provisions of the Constitution
of the United States; yet those State laws, void as they are, have given
color to practices, and led to consequences, which have obstructed the due
administration and execution of acts of Congress, and especially the acts
for the delivery of fugitive slaves, and have thereby contributed much to
the discord and commotion now prevailing. Congress, therefore, in the
present perilous juncture, does not deem it improper, respectfully and
earnestly to recommend the repeal of those laws to the several States which
have enacted them, or such legislative corections or explanations of them as
may prevent their being used or perverted to such mischievous purposes.
3. That the act of the 18th of September, 1850, commonly called the fugitive
slave law, ought to be so amended as to make the fee of the commissioner,
mentioned in the eighth section of the act, equal in amount in the cases
decided by him, whether his decision be in favor of or against the claimant.
And to avoid misconstruction, the last clause of the fifth section of said
act, which authorizes the person holding a warrent for the arrest or
detention of a fugitive slave, to summon to his aid the posse comitatus, and
which declares it to be the duty of all good citizens to assist him in its
execution, ought to be so amended as to expressly limit the authority and
duty to cases in which there shall be resistance or danger of resistance or
rescue.
4. That the laws for the suppression of the African slave trade, and
especially those prohibiting the importation of slaves in the United States,
ought to be made effectual, and ought to be thoroughly executed; and all
further enactments necessary to those ends ought to be promptly made.
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The U. S. Constitution
