Document C: “The Missouri Compromise, 1820”
This passage is an excerpt from the Missouri Compromise. This compromise admitted Missouri to the Union as a slave state
and admitted Maine to the Union as a free state, maintaining a balance between free and slave states. It also prohibited any
new slave states north of the 36°30’ line in the former Louisiana Territory
An Act to authorize the people of the Missouri territory to form a constitution and state government, and
for the admission of such state into the Union on an equal footing with the original states, and to prohibit
slavery in certain territories. SEC 8. And be it further enacted. That in all that territory ceded by France to
the United States, under the name of Louisiana, which lies north of thirty-six degrees and thirty minutes
north latitude, not included within the limits of the state, contemplated by this act, slavery and involuntary
servitude, otherwise than in the punishment of crimes, whereof the parties shall have been duly convicted,
shall be, and is hereby, forever prohibited: Provided always. That any person escaping into the same, from
whom labour or service is lawfully claimed, in any state or territory of the United States, such fugitive may
be lawfully reclaimed and conveyed to the person claiming his or her labor or service aforesaid.
APPROVED, March 6, 1820
Document D: “The Tallmadge Amendment”
This passage is an excerpt from Representative John W. Taylor’s argument to the House of Representatives for the Tallmadge
Amendment to the Missouri Compromise. This amendment sought to put an end to slavery in Missouri within a
generation.
"Gentlemen now have an opportunity of putting their principles into practice. If they have tried
slavery and found it a curse, if they desire to dissipate the gloom with which it causes their land, I call upon
them to exclude it from the Territory in question. Plant not its seeds in this uncorrupt soil. Let not our
children, looking back to the proceedings of this day, say of them, as they have been constrained to speak of
their fathers, "We wish their decision had been different. We regret the existence of this unfortunate
population among us. But we found them here; we know not what to do with them. It is our misfortune; we
must bear it with patience.." Source: Excerpt from Representative John W. Taylor's argument to the House
for the Tallmadge amendment to the Missouri Compromise. (1819)