Compromise+of+1850-SH



The Compromise of 1850 allowed California to join the United States as a free state and took away restrictions on slavery in the organization of the Mexican cession. Clay also proposed that Congress would be banned from interfering with the slave trade and would pass a law to help Southerner recover African American runaways. This proposal assured the South that the North wouldn't try to attempt to abolish slavery after California joined the U.S.

Along with the Compromise of 1850, Henry Clay convinced the Congress to pass the Fugitive Slave Act. This law allowed slaveholders to have more power in putting alleged runaways to be put back into custody. Even if they earned they're freedom years before, the accused would be brough forth before a federal comissioner. The Fugitive Slave Act took away the freedoms some slaves earned and this caused people to actively defy the laws. This group of people are called abolitionist.