Thats at 8 00 p. M. Eastern time here on cspan 3. The cspan radio app makes it easy to follow the election. Get audio coverage and up to the minute Schedule Information for cspan radio and television. Stay uptodate on all the election coverage. C spans radio app means you always have cspan on the go. Next author talks about the compromise of 1850 and the two generations of senators of the debate. Mr. Bordewich focuses on the compromise that preserved the union. The New York Historical society, Oxford University press and the Bryant Park Corporation hosts this event. Its just under 90 minutes. Can you hear me . Good evening. Thank you, paul. And were delighted at the New York Historical society to partner with the Bryant Park Corporation and Oxford Community press on this exciting series. Tonights program will be followed by question and answer session and a book signing. So please do join in for both. Im really delighted this evening to welcome author and historian fergus m. Bordewich. He is the author of six nonfiction books. He is also published in illustrated childrens books and wrote the script for mr. Jeffersons university. Hes a regular contributor to Smithsonian University and his articles have appeared in many magazines and newspapers, including the new york times, the wall street journal and american hearitage. His new book explores the way in which slavery distorted american controversy in the years leading up to the civil war. David Levering Lewis is one of the distinguished historians of the historical rights union. He is professor at New York University and recipient of the National Humanitarian medals confirmed by barack obama in 2009. He is the author of many books, including king, which is an exploration of the life of dr. Martin luther king jr. And web debois, which earned him the part man prize and two pew lit ser prices. Im proud to welcome both of them back to a New York Historical society sponsored evening. They are great favorites with us and delighted to ask them to begin their conversation. Thank you. Thank you. Fergus, what a cast of characters your book has. The familiar ones, thomas heart benton, perhaps not so familiar, james stewart, William Stewart perhaps not so familiar, but still of great importance at the time. But clay and cal hoon and webster and you catch these men at what must be the e pitmy of their public lives. 1850, the great debate and the compromise that preserved the union. And we follow this debate some nine or ten months, i think, of 1,000 pages of discourse and expatientuation and debate and god knows how many how many votes and finally, in september, thanks to the wiz czar dri of Steven A Douglas we have a compromise that not even henry clay had the all come my to produce. Well, all of this was necessary stated, i suppose by the regime crisis of 1890 comes from americas first imperial venture. This is when we become an empire, and we havent stopped since. The mentixican american waf of 1846, 48. As i read these debates swirling around the dividends and consequences of that Mexican American war, i thought i would ask you this question. Is it mischee vous, counter factual, but nonetheless, i think useful. Would the topic of your book have been unnecessary if the whig party headed by henry clay had won the election of 1844 . You cite his torn gary cornblitzs of that in 1844, henry clay president , not james polling, and a very different scenario. Well, before asking you to answer that question, would you remind us of the National Real estate options presented at the conclusion of americas first imperil war. What did the treaty of gaud lieu pay actually give us . Well, im eager to get the hypothetical that you pose, but to answer the, perhaps, larger question of what this war meant and indeed it was the countrys first openly and eagerly em peer yall war. The creation of the war was part of the language at the time. American easterls by and large proud to march off to earn an empire in the battlefield by marching into mexico. What we acquired, what the nation acquired, of course, is virtually all the rest of the continent, as you know, from the western edge of the luis yan that purchase, including far more than the present day state of mexico and significantly california. Just on the kusing of the discovery of gold in california. And, already, without gold stir into the political mix here, the question the country faced the question, well, what was this going to become, this vast lar largely tera, what kinds of states would be formed there. Would there be states formed there. Would they be slave . Would they be free because by the end of the 1840s, slavery, of course infested every question bearing on the expansion of the United States. To put this into context, there were many additional ideas circulating, changing from the conquest of chunks of canada, the acquisition of cuba, which could form one or two new slave states, to compensate for free states that might be carved out of the western territory or perhaps a second mexican war that would that would incorporate yet more of mexico into the United States. So the country faced huge questions about what it was going to be, what was going to be the political nature of this vast western territory. And to come to your teasing question about about the outcome of the election of 1844 and henry clay, henry clay, for those who may not be quite as emersed in him as you and i have been at one time or another, clay was a was probably after webster regarded as the most compelling and charismatic or der of his day, founder of the whig party, a man who inspired an intensity of emotion, both even these yach among his even anies and contempt. There was a cult of kissing henry clay. Women swarmed after him and competed with each other to kiss him as many times as possible or as to snip bits of his hair when he wasnt looking. But at any rate, here was clay at the, one could say the angy of his career, or the great final phase of his career. He aspired to be president for decades. Having given us the compromise. And crafting the compromise that culminated the so clay had been in retirement before 1850 for a while and was called back on to the staj to craft yet this third compromise. Clay hoped to be the whig co nominee in 1844. Its been argued that there probably would have been no mexican war. Clay opposed the mexican war. Though, his son was to die in it on one of the battlefields of the war. With clay as president , would the nation have expanded all the way to the pacific. Would california have become part of the United States . These are open questions. What do i think personally . I think the desire for empire, american ambitions trance sended the personality of one man, and i think clays politics might have held clay might have kept his finger in the dike a bit longer, but i dont think the empire would have stopped. So, then, the will not proviso is the element that will make this disposition of real estate really and come pra bli difficult and challenging. Without that proviso of david will month, a pennsylvania backwoods congressman, it seems to be just who propose that any of the territory exceeded to the United States from the mexican war would be based on popular sovereignty and that slavery would be absent from that territory. And this really fueled the controversy from almost the getgo, didnt it . Yes, it did. It the wilmont proviso is one of those items of American History that most High School Students forget instantly, as soon as theyve gotten through the exam. But, indeed, it was the pivot, one of the certainly a pivot on which the crisis of 1850 began to turn. It predated 1850 by a couple of years, but it meant that every time the discussion of up state hood for any western territory came before congress, there would be a bitter, not to say violent, increasingly violent collision between demographically increasing northern northern forces that wanted to preclude the west ward expansion of savory and increasingly fierce in sus session minded southern defenders of savely by the late 1840s were insisting that slavery was nothing to be embarrassed about but rather an essential part of the american dream, and to deprive any americans of the right to own slaves and carry slavery where any slave master pleased was to deprive him of his essential rights as an american. And this came to a head, of course, with the application of california to enter the state as a froo date. Why did that precipitate a crisis . At that point free states or representatives of free states held an ever enlarging majority in the house of representatives, but in the senate 15 slave states were balanced against 15 free states. The admission of california as a free state would tip the balance and southerners feared, with good reason, permanently because they could see that if settlers in the west, by and large, were allowed to choose whether it would be slave or free, very free would make their states slave states. California made the decision imperative because gold had been discovered. 200,000 settlers moved from the east coast or from the Eastern States to california in the space of barely a year, far, far, far more people than the law required to be present to form a state. So willy nilly, california was going to come into the union. How was it going to come . So thats the challenge of henry clay then, who on in january delivers his first address on this whirling question. You paint a picture of such tenseness, such drama. I think the guardians of the senate had to bar the doors against nabobs who had come from afar who wanted to see this secty cal. This was the Television Drama of its day. And when quiet is restored, clay rises and he makes three proposals or rather, im sorry, he proposes eight resolutions rather complicated, but the upshot of them would have been that there would have been to satisfy the south a prohibition on congress having anything to say about the constitution of these states from the point of view of the institution of slavery, that there would be a settlement of the border of texas finally with mexico at the rio gran day, that there would be compensation to mexico for the properties that it had lost to texas as the as the map was redrawn, that there would be and this seemed to be not a great issue at the moment, a really effective fuguetive slave law so that the property of southerners that migrated to the north and elsewhere on underground railroad that you have described so well that filtration of property through the years would cease because the federal government would assure that the apprehension of these vag ga bonds and these else skap peas would take place and there would be a return of the escapees. And the guarantee that congress would never attempt to prohibit the slave trade within the slave holding states. Well, that seemed for a moment, i gather, to satisfy enough people that there seemed to be a compromise within reach that week, but i gather by the end of the week as people thought about it, as the details were scrutinized carefully, it began to be more and more difficult to press this. But on the 5th of march, he stood again. And this time with all the eloquence that you capture, he he expatientuated on these resolutions. Well, you say you ask. You say, how on earth, how on earth did they do it . How did they make the paralyzed system finally work if we will just jump ahead to what actually did work . And i want to read, if i may, the pros that applies to that question. You say, in your preface, the poll tested spin doctored shotly argued and grammatically challenged messages that today passes for political communication is pathetic and often incoherent by comparison. It can be no surprise that Many Americans have lost interest in politicians who have forgotten how much can be accomplished by the sur sway sieve power of well crafted english. In 1850 senators and congressmen who more often than not lacked college education, spoke from the barest of notes or not at all, for hours on end, and were confident that their colleagues in the public would understand them in speechers that were peppered with illusions to shakes peer, the bible, british common law and classical literature. They also said what they meant. Men who believed in slavery said sorks as did those who hated it. No matter how much their words attracted, by listening in on the debate of 1850, we can learn much not only about the american thought about what americans thought about their new empire, about the profound ways in which slavery warped our political system and the creative craft of compromise but also how to talk politics to each other so that we actually listen. I read this as i had just listened to talking head program about the gridlock in in our congress. And i thought, is it really true that if so lans have coagainsy and eloquence and candor that, in fact, they would deliver us from stay sis and paralysis and ie dee logical warp . So i really wanted to read what happened with clay and douglas and the compromise. What was the compromise . And then ill ask, after you tell us what the compromise, what we might think of it. Okay. Well, first, just a word or two to kind of create the atmosphere in which this was taking place. It is impossible to exaggerate the the sense of crisis that pervaded the nation at large, taverns, churches, cross roads, villages, cities, every class of americans and, of course, congress itself on the cusp of this great tenmonth long debate in 1850. There was a perception, a very widespread perception that the country was about to crack apart, as of course it would in 1861. Civil war seemed imminent. Warfa warfare, an invasion of the south by the north or vice versa, and newspapers predicted that there would be blood on the floors of congress itself any day. And, indeed, in one instance there practically was when senator henry foot pulled a horse pistol on Thomas Benton on the floor of the senate and threatened to blow his head off. Of course, i was talking to somebody about this not long ago who said, well, if you will bed to thomas heart bet ton for ten months you might want to do the same thing. He was unkind. Might i add that senator foot was also a, and i think we are going to lose our president zachary tailor because on july 4th of 1850, foot is going to give the july 4th duration which will go on and on and ond under a sun under todays so that the president will die of sunstroke. Later. So the compromise itself so bear in mind this atmosphere of terrible crisis. Youre familiar with the sense of crisis of 1861. It was the same in 1850. People expected the country to break any time. And break not necessarily just into two parts, a southern confederacy and the remainder of the union but perhaps into three or four because one sus session had begun it would be established as a president. Fearful congressmen and senators are talking about the near inevidentability of a specific confederacy, a northmidwest earn confederacy. This is the fear that pervades people, and this is what clay is addressing when he stands up in the senate as david has described him. And clay has a profound faith in the power of persuasive political argument, and he is, indeed, persuasive. His speeches are magnificent. Theyre literature that rise to the level of art as many of these speeches by webster and many of the less wellknown men of the moment did as well. So he believes in the power of persuasion, and he believes that by persuading other members of the senate and bear in mind the same debate is taking place in the house of representatives. Although, were dwelling here primarily in the senate that he can win enough people from the radical fringes. That means the left and the right of the time. That means from amongst abolition niss who oppose any compromise with the south and from amongst Southern National lists who oppose any kind of compromise of that would that would undermine their right in their minds to enslave other people and to carry slavery to as far as they wish. And does clay succeed . Youve outlined his various proposals. And these are the core of the compromise. Clay comes into the senate with the idea in his mind, his brain as one of the commentators of the time described it. He has a rather large forehead that looks like its stuffed with wonderful ideas. And hes determined to craft a compromise that will answer all the countrys anxieties about slavery, not just the admission of california, not just a resolution of this extremely dangerous and contention texas border conflict. And a tiny correction, it was texas rather than mexico. It was texass claim because texas was financially underwater and was looking for a federal handout. I stand corrected. Yeah. And it would be texass payoff for not invading the new mexico territory on behalf of the rest of the slave owning south. Texas has mustered an army of Texas Rangers ready to march on sanity faye. The first shots would have been in new mexico because the federal forces were prepared to fight the texas troops if they crossed the territory line. So at any rate, clay understands, as many do, that slavery is going to bring on a war unless the rush to war is halted. So hes trying to address the concerns of the north, concerns of the south by giving a peace in his view to each part of the country, whether those pieces are fairly shared out in the end is a subject of very largely scholarly debate. Did his persuasion work . No. Clay did not accomplish the compromise that he believed over months and months and months of contention, exhausting debate that goes into the summer in washington, hundreddegree heat day after day. Clay is so brutal in his handling of the senate, hes in effect the floor leader during this debate, that he refuses to allow a recess even to take up the filthy tobacco stained smelly carpets or to have the curtains cleaned. Senators are begging him pathetically to have this done, but hes pushing, pushing, pushing. And in the end he cant do it because he cant poach. His persuasiveness cant poach enough people from either the read cal end of the political spectrum. At some point, does it not happen, though, that clay initially had thought that each