How Did John Crittenden Compromise

When Abraham Lincoln became President there was a fear from the southerners that the southern way of life would end. The southerners thought that if the western territories became free states that the Republicans would change the Constitution and make slavery in all areas outlawed and many thought that they would leave the Union before this inflicted upon them. The southerners held back from the division until 1860 when Lincoln became President. In history it is known that South Carolina was the first state that began the secession. “On December 20, 1860, a state convention repealed South Carolina’s ratification of the U.S. Constitution and voted to withdraw from the Union. It did not want to be part of a nation in which it had no control.” (Schultz, n.d.). On February 07, 1861, several other states including Mississippi, Florida,

(Schultz, n.d.). The Confederate States of America were the first to willing withdraw from the Union as they tended to have more slaveholding families and the Northern territories were the last to withdraw from the Union as they tended to have fewer slaves. In order to prevent this from becoming a war John Crittenden and Abraham Lincoln tried to come up with several ways to compromise with the situation at hand. The first attempt was by John Crittenden with the Crittenden Compromise which was unsuccessful. This compromise was a “reconciliation proposal advocating that the Missouri Compromise line of 1820 be extended all the way to the Pacific, excluding California, with all the land north of the line free; all the land south of it open to slavery; also included an “unamendable amendment” to the Constitution, guaranteeing the preservation of slavery in the southern states where it already existed.” (Schultz, n.d.). Lincoln then began to reach out to the southerners to reassure them that he would not cause problems in states where slavery already existed and that if they did not withdraw from the Union they could remain