y any twist
or turn be confined to state control, drew the slave system and its
defenders into the political conflict that centered at Washington.

=Slavery and the Territories--the Missouri Compromise (1820).=--Though
men continually talked about "taking slavery out of politics," it could
not be done. By 1818 slavery had become so entrenched and the
anti-slavery sentiment so strong, that Missouri's quest for admission
brought both houses of Congress into a deadlock that was broken only by
compromise. The South, having half the Senators, could prevent the
admission of Missouri stripped of slavery; and the North, powerful in
the House of Representatives, could keep Missouri with slavery out of
the union indefinitely. An adjustment of pretensions was the last
resort. Maine, separated from the parent state of Massachusetts, was
brought into the union with freedom and Missouri with bondage. At the
same time it was agreed that the remainder of the vast Louisiana
territory north of the parallel of 36 deg. 30' should be, like the old
Northwest, forever free; while the southern portion was left to slavery.
In reality this was an immense gain for liberty. The area dedicated to
free farmers was many times greater than that left to the planters. The
principle was once more asserted that Congress had full power to prevent
slavery in the territories.

[Illustration: THE MISSOURI COMPROMISE]

=The Territorial Question Reopened by the Wilmot Proviso.=--To the
Southern leaders, the annexation of Texas and the conquest of Mexico
meant renewed security to the planting interest against the increasing
wealth and population of the North. Texas, it was said, could be divided
into four slave states. The new territories secured by the treaty of
peace with Mexico contained the promise of at least three more. Thus, as
each new free soil state knocked for admission into the union, the
South could demand as the price of its consent a new slave state. No
wonder Southern statesmen saw, in the annexation of Texas and the
conquest of Mexico, slavery and King Cotton triumphant--secure for all
time against adverse legislation. Northern leaders were equally
convinced that the Southern prophecy was true. Abolitionists and
moderate opponents of slavery alike were in despair. Texas, they
lamented, would fasten slavery upon the country forevermore. "No living
man," cried one, "will see the end of slavery in the United States!"

It so happened, however, t