What was the Great Compromise?

Answer 1

When the slavery issue threatened to dissolve the Union in 1850, 72-year-old Kentucky Sen. Henry Clay placed before Congress several provisions that he hoped would placate sectional antagonisms. After 10 weeks of intense debate, the bill, which Stephen A. Douglas of Illinois shepherded through the legislative process, reached the Senate floor as a modified but politically brilliant compromise measure, calling for California to be admitted as a free state; for the passage of a strict Fugitive Slave law; for new territories in the Southwest to he allowed to organize without restrictions on slavery; for protecting slavery in the District of Columbia while abolishing domestic slave trade there; and for a settlement of $10 million to Texas if the state would relinquish claims to certain lands in New Mexico Territory.