American History Series: Pierce, New President, Is Friendly but Weak
In 1853 Franklin Pierce had to choose between two policies on slavery. One would lead to a fight with northern and southern extremists. The other would bring them into his administration. Transcript of radio broadcast:
16 April 2009
Welcome to THE MAKING OF A NATION — American history in VOA Special English.
In eighteen fifty, President Zachary Taylor died after serving about a year and a half in office. Taylor’s vice president, Millard Fillmore, took his place.
Early in his administration, President Fillmore signed the Compromise of Eighteen Fifty. That compromise helped settle a dispute over slavery and the western territories. It ended a crisis between northern and southern states. It prevented a civil war.
The eighteen fifty compromise did not, however, end slavery in the United States. So the issue was not really settled. It continued to affect the nation. And it was the most important issue of Millard Fillmore’s presidency.
Here are Kay Gallant and Harry Monroe with this week’s program in our series.
VOICE ONE:
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In eighteen fifty-two, an American woman published a book about slavery. She called it “Uncle Tom’s Cabin.” The woman, Harriet Beecher Stowe, wrote the book for one reason. She wanted to show how cruel slavery was. Stowe’s words painted a picture of slavery that most people in the North had never seen. They were shocked.
Public pressure to end slavery grew strong. Abolitionists wanted to free all slaves immediately. Even if that could be done, there was the question of what to do with the freed slaves. Their rights as citizens were limited. Some states closed their borders to negroes. Other states permitted negroes, but said they could not vote.
In many places, it seemed impossible that negroes and whites could live together peacefully, in freedom. The best answer, many people thought, was to free the slaves and help them return to Africa.
VOICE TWO:
It was not a new idea. Forty years earlier, a group of leading Americans had formed an organization for that purpose. They called it the American Colonization Society.
In eighteen twenty, the Society began helping send negroes to Africa. The negroes formed a government of their own. In eighteen forty-seven, they declared themselves independent. They called their new country the Republic of Liberia. The new country had a constitution like that of the United States.
By eighteen fifty-four, nine thousand negroes from the United States had been sent to Liberia. Some had technical skills. They knew how to make iron. They knew how to use steam engines and other machinery. The Colonization Society hoped these negroes would use their skills to help improve life for the people of Africa. The Society’s plan ended a cruel life of slavery for many negroes.
But it could not be denied that the plan was a way to get black people out of the United States. Many whites refused to accept the fact that most free negroes did not want to go to Africa. The negroes had grown up in the United States. It was their home.
VOICE ONE:
Negro slaves took great chances to escape to freedom. Many gained their freedom through the so-called “underground railroad.” That was not a real railroad. It was an organization of people who secretly helped slaves escape to the North.
An escaped slave would be hidden during the day by a member of the organization. Then at night, the negro would be taken to another hiding place farther north. The process was repeated every day and night until the escaped slave was safe in New England or even Canada.
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VOICE TWO:
The year eighteen fifty-two was a presidential election year in the United States. The eighteen fifty compromise was a major issue in the campaign. A number of men wanted to be the presidential candidate of the Democratic Party. They included senators Lewis Cass of Michigan and Stephen Douglas of Illinois.
Another was former secretary of state James Buchanan. Cass and Douglas supported the idea of letting the people of a territory decide if slavery would be permitted in that territory. Buchanan opposed the anti-slavery movements of the north. Because of this, he had many supporters in the South.
VOICE ONE:
The Democrats opened their presidential nominating convention in Baltimore on the first of June, eighteen fifty-two. The delegates agreed that a man must win two-thirds of the convention’s votes to be the party’s candidate.
On the first ballot, no one got two-thirds of the vote. So the voting continued. Finally, on the forty-seventh ballot, support began to increase for one of the minor candidates. His name was Franklin Pierce.
Pierce was from the northeastern state of New Hampshire. He had served as a congressman and senator. On the forty-ninth ballot, Pierce won. He would be the Democratic Party’s candidate for president.
VOICE TWO:
The Whig party held its presidential nominating convention in Baltimore two weeks after the Democrats. Three Whigs wanted to be nominated: President Millard Fillmore, Secretary of State Daniel Webster and General Winfield Scott.
The same thing that happened at the Democratic convention now happened at the Whig convention. Delegates voted over and over again. But no man got enough votes to win. It took fifty-three ballots before one of the men — General Scott — won the nomination.
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VOICE ONE:
The presidential campaign lasted about five months. The election was in November. Pierce, the Democrat, won a crushing victory over Scott, the Whig. The Democratic victory was so great that many people thought the Whig Party was finished. In fact, many Whigs themselves hoped their party had been destroyed.
Northern Whigs wanted to form a new anti-slavery party. And southern Whigs wanted to form a party that would better represent their interests. The Democrats won the election, because they were able to bridge the differences between their northern and southern members. The Whigs were not able to do that.
VOICE TWO:
The new president, Franklin Pierce, was a charming man. He made friends easily. Those who knew Pierce best worried about this. They knew that under all his friendly charm, he was a weak man. They feared that the duties and problems of the presidency would be too great for him to deal with. As president in eighteen fifty-three, Pierce was forced to choose between two policies on the issue of slavery.
He could support the Compromise of Eighteen Fifty and declare it to be the final settlement of the problem. That would lead to a fight with northern and southern extremists. Or he could compromise with the extremists and give them jobs in his administration. That would be the easy way to satisfy their demands. And that was the policy Pierce chose.
VOICE ONE:
In putting together his cabinet, President Pierce tried to include men from every group in the Democratic Party. He named William Marcy of New York to be secretary of state. Marcy opposed the spread of slavery and all talk of splitting the Union.
Jefferson Davis of Mississippi was named secretary of war. Davis, more than any other man, represented the southern extremists. He had threatened to take the South out of the Union if any limits were put on slavery.
Caleb Cushing of Massachusetts was named attorney general. Although a northerner, Cushing was a friend of many southern extremists. He was a very able man, but his loyalties were not clear. James Buchanan of Pennsylvania was named Minister to Britain.
VOICE TWO:
All of these men had strong ideas about the future of the United States. President Pierce found it difficult to control them.
One senator said the administration should not have been called the Pierce administration, because Pierce did not lead it. He said it was an administration of enemies of the Union who used the president’s name and power for their own purposes.
VOICE ONE:
For a time, things were peaceful. The dispute over slavery had cooled. But thoughtful people did not believe that peace would last long. No permanent solution had been found to settle differences over slavery and the right of states to leave the Union.
One northerner wrote: “It was said hundreds of years ago that a house divided against itself cannot stand. The truth of this saying is written on every page in history. It is likely that the history of our own country may offer fresh examples to teach this truth to future ages.”
We will continue our story of the presidency of Franklin Pierce next week.
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ANNOUNCER:
Our program was written by Frank Beardsley. The narrators were Kay Gallant and Harry Monroe. Transcripts, MP3s and podcasts of our programs can be found along with historical images at voaspecialenglish.com. Join us again next week for THE MAKING OF A NATION — an American history series in VOA Special English.
This is program #80 of THE MAKING OF A NATION
American History Series: Millard Fillmore Signs Compromise of 1850
Many people believed the problem of slavery had been solved and that the Union had been saved. Others, though, believed the problem had only been postponed. Last of four parts. Transcript of radio broadcast:
08 April 2009
ANNOUNCER:
Welcome to THE MAKING OF A NATION – American history in VOA Special English.
In eighteen fifty, the United States Congress debated a proposal for an important compromise. The compromise dealt mostly with the national dispute over slavery. That dispute threatened to split the northern and southern parts of the country. There was a danger of civil war. Many leaders supported the compromise. But President Zachary Taylor did not.
This week in our series, Leo Scully and Larry West complete our story of the Compromise of Eighteen Fifty.
VOICE ONE:
Taylor did not think there was a crisis. He did not believe the dispute over slavery was as serious as others did. He had his own plan to settle one part of the dispute. He would make the new territory of California a free state. Slavery there would be banned.
Taylor’s plan did not, however, settle other parts of the dispute. It said nothing about laws on escaped slaves. It said nothing about slavery in the nation’s capital, the District of Columbia. It said nothing about the border dispute between Texas and New Mexico. The congressional compromise was an attempt to settle all these problems.
VOICE TWO:
Senator Henry Clay of Kentucky, who had written the compromise, questioned the president’s limited proposal. Clay said: “Now what is the plan of the president? Here are five problems, five wounds that are bleeding and threatening the life of the republic. What is the president’s plan? Is it to heal all these wounds? No such thing. It is to heal one of the five and to leave the other four to bleed more than ever.”
VOICE ONE:
While the debate continued in Washington, the situation in Texas and New Mexico got worse. Texas claimed a large part of New Mexico, including the capital, Santa Fe. Early in eighteen fifty, Texas sent a representative to Santa Fe to take control of the government.
The United States military commander in New Mexico advised the people not to recognize the man. The governor of Texas was furious. He decided to send state soldiers to enforce Texas’s claims in New Mexico. He said if trouble broke out, the United States government would be to blame.
VOICE TWO:
President Taylor rejected Texas’s claims. He told his secretary of war to send an order to the military commander in New Mexico. The commander was to use force to oppose any attempt by Texas to seize the territory.
The secretary of war said he would not send such an order. He believed that if fighting began, southerners would hurry to the aid of Texas. And that, he thought, might be the start of a southern struggle against the federal government.
In a short time, the North and South would be at war. When the secretary of war refused to sign the order, President Taylor answered sharply. “Then I will sign the order myself!”
Taylor had been a general before becoming president. He said he would take command of the army himself to enforce the law. And he said he was willing to hang anyone who rebelled against the Union.
VOICE ONE:
President Taylor began writing a message to Congress on the situation. He never finished it. On the afternoon of July fourth, eighteen fifty, Taylor attended an outdoor independence day ceremony. The ceremony was held at the place where a monument to America’s first president, George Washington, was being built.
The day was very hot, and Taylor stood for a long time in the burning sun. That night, he became sick with pains in his stomach. Doctors were called to the White House. But none of their treatments worked.
Five days later, President Taylor died. Vice President Millard Fillmore was sworn-in as president.
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VOICE TWO:
Fillmore was from New York state. His family was poor. His early education came not from school teachers, but from whatever books he could find. Later, Fillmore was able to study law. He became a successful lawyer. He also served in the United States Congress for eight years.
The Whig Party chose him as its vice presidential candidate in the election of eighteen forty-eight. He served as vice president for about a year and a half before the death of President Taylor.
VOICE ONE:
Fillmore had disagreed with Taylor over the congressional compromise on slavery and the western territories. Unlike Taylor, Fillmore truly believed that the nation was facing a crisis. And he truly believed the compromise would help save the Union.
Now, as president, Fillmore offered his complete support to the bill. Its chances of passing looked better than ever. Fillmore asked the old cabinet to resign. He named his own cabinet members. All were strong supporters of the union. All supported the compromise.
VOICE TWO:
Congress debated the compromise throughout the summer of eighteen fifty. There were several proposals in the bill. Supporters decided not to vote on the proposals as one piece of legislation. They saw a better chance of success by trying to pass each proposal separately. Their idea worked.
By the end of September, both the Senate and House of Representatives had approved all parts of the eighteen fifty compromise.
President Fillmore signed them into law. One part of the compromise permitted California to enter the Union as a free state. One established territorial governments in New Mexico and Utah. One settled the dispute between Texas and New Mexico. Another ended the slave trade in the District of Columbia.
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VOICE ONE:
Many happy celebrations took place when citizens heard that President Fillmore had signed the eighteen fifty compromise. Many people believed the problem of slavery had been solved. They believed the Union had been saved.
Others, however, believed the problem had only been postponed. They hoped the delay would give reasonable men of the North and South time to find a permanent answer to the issue of slavery. Time was running out.
VOICE TWO:
It was true that the eighteen fifty compromise had ended a national crisis. But both northern and southern extremists remained bitter. Those opposed to slavery believed the compromise law on runaway slaves violated the constitution.
The new law said negroes accused of being runaway slaves could not have a jury trial. It said government officials could send negroes to whoever claimed to own them. It said negroes could not appeal such a decision.
Those who supported slavery had a different idea of the compromise. They did not care about the constitutional rights of negroes. They considered the compromise a simple law for the return of valuable property. No law approved by Congress, and signed by the president, could change these beliefs.
VOICE ONE:
The issue of slavery was linked to the issue of secession. Did states have the right to leave the Union? If southern states rejected all compromises on slavery, did they have the right to secede? The signing of the eighteen fifty compromise cooled the debate for a time. But disagreement on the issues was deep. It would continue to build over the next ten years. Those were difficult years for America’s presidents.
Next week, we will tell how the situation affected the administration of President Millard Fillmore.
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ANNOUNCER:
Our program was written by Frank Beardsley. The narrators were Leo Scully and Larry West. Transcripts, MP3s and podcasts of our programs are online, along with historical images, at voaspecialenglish.com. Join us again next week for THE MAKING OF A NATION — an American history series in VOA Special English.
This is program #79 of THE MAKING OF A NATION
American History Series: ‘The South Asks for Justice, Simple Justice’
Second of four parts: The Compromise of 1850 sought to save the Union and prevent civil war over slavery and other issues. Transcript of radio broadcast:
25 March 2009
Welcome to the MAKING OF A NATION – American history in VOA Special English.
During the first half of the nineteenth century, leaders of the United States could find no answer to the question of slavery. The dispute grew more threatening after the war with Mexico in eighteen forty-nine.
Northern states refused to permit slavery in the new territories of California and New Mexico. Southern states declared that they had a constitutional right to bring slaves into the new lands. The South was ready to secede — leave and break up the Union of states.
Then, in eighteen fifty, Senator Henry Clay of Kentucky offered a compromise to avoid secession, and a likely war between the North and the South. He said the Union was permanent and created for all future Americans. He attacked the South’s claim that it had the right to leave. He warned that the war which would follow southern secession would be long and bloody.
This week in our series, Jack Moyles and Lew Roland continue the story of the Compromise of Eighteen Fifty.
VOICE ONE:
Extremists on both sides opposed Clay’s compromise proposals. So did President Taylor. The president had hoped that Webster, Clay, and other Whig Party leaders would support his own limited plan of statehood for California. The president’s feelings were hurt when none of the party leaders thought that his idea was important.
The president’s chief adviser, Senator Seward of New York, was also against Clay’s proposals. Seward strongly opposed slavery and did not believe it was right to compromise on it.
One week after Clay spoke, Senator Jefferson Davis of Mississippi explained his position. He did not say much about Clay’s proposed compromise. Davis was sure that no good would result from it, not even from stronger laws on the return of escaped slaves. He said these laws would not be enforced in states where people opposed slavery.
VOICE TWO:
Senator Davis said that what was needed was a change in the North’s policy toward the South. He said the North must recognize the rights of southerners, especially the right to take slave property into territories of the United States.
Davis said Congress had no right to destroy or limit this right. He admitted that the old Missouri compromise of eighteen twenty had limited the right to take slaves into the territories. He said the eighteen twenty compromise worked — not because Congress passed it — but because the states agreed to it.
Senator Davis said the North was responsible for the growing split, because the North was trying to get complete control of the South. He said if these efforts were not stopped, the North some day would be powerful enough to change the Constitution and end slavery everywhere. Davis warned that the South would never accept this.
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VOICE ONE:
Three weeks later, the Senate heard another southern leader, Senator John C. Calhoun. For years, Calhoun was the voice of the South. He now was sixty-eight years old and a sick man. He would die within a month. Calhoun had been too ill to hear Clay’s speech. He spent the last week in February writing what he believed to be the true position of the South.
On Sunday, March third, it was announced that Calhoun would speak in the Senate the next day. Most understood that it would be his last speech. The Senate was crowded when Calhoun entered.
One by one, friends came up to speak to him. The old man’s long, gray hair fell to his shoulders. His face was thin and white. But his eyes were bright and his jaw firm. Calhoun was too weak to read his speech. He asked Senator Mason to read it for him.
VOICE TWO:
Calhoun said that for a long time he had believed that the dispute over slavery — if not settled — would end in disunion. Calhoun said it was clear now to everyone that the Union was breaking apart, that the ties that had held the North and South together were breaking, one by one.
Three churches, once united across the nation, now were split between North and South. The two major political parties, he declared, were divided in the same way. Calhoun said the North was responsible for all this, because it had destroyed the political balance between the two parts of the country.
As the population of the North had grown large, he noted, that part of the country had seized political and economic control. The North had passed tariff bills that the South opposed. It had filled most of the offices in the federal government. It closed the new territories to southern slaveholders. And, said Calhoun, it had viciously attacked the southern institution of slavery.
VOICE ONE:
The situation was so bad, Calhoun said, that the South could not — with honor and safety — remain in the Union. “How can the Union be saved?” he asked. “Not by the compromise proposed by the senator from Kentucky. There is but one way. A full and final settlement, with justice, of all the questions disputed by the two sections.
“The South asks for justice, simple justice, and less she ought not to take. She has no compromise to offer but the Constitution, and no concession or surrender to make. She has already surrendered so much that she has little left to surrender.”
Then Calhoun listed the things the North must do to satisfy the South. He said it must give the South an equal right in the new territories of the West. It must make people obey the laws on the return of runaway slaves. It must agree to an amendment to the constitution that would return political balance to North and South. And it must stop the attacks against slavery.
If all these things were not done, Calhoun said, then it would be better to separate, to part in peace. But if the North refused a peaceful separation, then the South would be faced with the choice of surrender or fight. “The South will know what to do,” said Calhoun.
VOICE TWO:
When Calhoun finished his speech to the Senate, southern lawmakers crowded around the old man, congratulating him. But many of them could not agree with his extreme demands and the violence of his words. His appeal was too late. Most southerners believed that Clay’s proposals were a reasonable way to settle the difference and protect the union.
Clay was worried that his compromise might be defeated by northern votes. Many in the North felt slavery was wrong. They opposed the compromise, because it might permit slavery in the New Mexico territory, and because it called for stronger laws on the return of slaves who had escaped to the North.
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VOICE ONE:
Eight days before he first proposed the compromise, Clay visited Senator Daniel Webster of Massachusetts. A friend of Webster’s described the meeting in these words: “Mister Clay came to Mister Webster’s house and had a long talk with him about the best way to settle the difficulties growing out of slavery and the new territories. I heard part of their conversation.”
“Mister Clay left after about an hour. Mister Webster called me to his side and spoke to me of Mister Clay in words of great kindness. He said he agreed generally with Mister Clay, that he thought Mister Clay’s purpose was great and highly patriotic.”
“He said Mister Clay seemed to be very weak and had a very bad cough, that he was sure Mister Clay wanted to do something for the good of his country during the little time he had left on Earth. Mister Webster said further that he thought Mister Clay’s plan was one that should be satisfactory to the North and to the reasonable men of the South. He said he believed that he could support all of it and would work for its approval in the Senate.”
VOICE TWO:
Webster planned to speak in support of Clay’s proposal. But he would wait until the best time for declaring it. He decided to make it on March seventh, just three days after Calhoun’s speech was read to the Senate. Webster was sixty-eight years old, as old as Calhoun. His voice was weaker now. But his words rang with the same strength as years earlier.
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ANNOUNCER:
Our story of the Compromise of Eighteen Fifty continues next week. Our program was written by Frank Beardsley. The narrators were Jack Moyles and Lew Roland.
Transcripts, MP3s and podcasts of our series can be found, along with historical images, at voaspecialenglish.com. Join us again next week for THE MAKING OF A NATION — an American history series in VOA Special English.
This is program #77 of THE MAKING OF A NATION
