and more capable leader. The two men, therefore, gradually
separated; Mr. Fillmore using what influence he possessed as Vice-
President in favor of Mr. Clay's plan of compromise, while Mr.
Seward became the Northern leader of the Administration Whigs,--a
remarkable if not unprecedented advance for a senator in the first
session of his service.

In succeeding to the Presidency, Mr. Fillmore naturally gave the
full influence of his administration to the Compromise. To signalize
his position, he appointed Mr. Webster secretary of State, and
placed Mr. Corwin of Ohio at the head of the Treasury. Mr. Corwin,
with a strong anti-slavery record, had been recently drifting in
the opposite direction, and his appointment was significant. It
was too late, however, to save the Omnibus Bill as a whole. The
Taylor administration had damaged it too seriously to permit an
effectual revival in its favor. It was finally destroyed the last
week in July by striking out in detail every provision except the
bill for the organization of the Territory of Utah. After the Utah
bill had been enacted, separate bills followed;--for the admission
of California; for the organization of New Mexico, with the same
condition respecting slavery which had been applied to Utah; for
the adjustment of the Texas boundary, and the payment to that State
of ten millions indemnity; for the more effectual recovery of
fugitive slaves; for the abolition of the slave trade in the District
of Columbia. Congress thus enacted separately the bills which it
refused to enact together, and the policy outlined by Mr. Clay at
the beginning of the session had triumphed. Several Southern
senators joined Jefferson Davis in strenuous resistance to the
admission of California with the boundaries prescribed. After
seeking ineffectually to make the line of 36 deg. 30' the southern
limit of the State, they attempted with equal lack of success
to enter a solemn protest on the journal of the Senate against
the wrong done to the slave-holding States in giving the
entire Pacific coast to freedom. It was a last and hopeless movement
of the Southern Hotspurs. The protest, at first discredited, was
speedily forgotten, and California entered the Union after ten
months of angry controversy, with slavery forever excluded from
her imperial domain.

THE FINALITY OF THE COMPROMISE.

The session had been in all respects important and memora