Program Information

By 1820 the American sectional crisis over the issue of slavery in territories applying for statehood was temporarily solved by the Missouri Compromise.

A Moment in Time is a brief, exciting and compelling journey into the past. Created to excite and enlighten the public about the past, its relevance to the present and its impact on the future, A Moment In Time is a captivating historical narrative that is currently broadcast worldwide.

Transcript

Lead: By 1820 the American sectional crisis over the issue of slavery in territories applying for statehood was temporarily solved by the Missouri Compromise.

Intro: A Moment In Time with Dan Roberts.

Content: By 1820 the debate over slavery focused upon the technical question of whether slavery could be restricted in territories applying for statehood. Southerners insisted on no federal restrictions. Northerners wanted to put a block on the spread of slavery into the states carved out of the Louisiana Purchase.

Deep sectional fears were aroused when Missouri began knocking on the door. In 1819 there was an even balance in Congress: eleven slaveholding states, eleven non-slaveholding states. The admission of Missouri as a slaveholding state would shift the balance of power in the U.S. Senate in favor of the south. Not surprisingly, the House of Representatives, a majority of its members coming from the north, refused to vote Missouri in without restrictions on slavery; southerners in the Senate insisted on no restrictions, and there resulted a bitter impasse.

In 1820 the elements of a compromise began to emerge. Maine, then a part of Massachusetts, requested admission as a state. Working behind the scenes, the Great Compromiser, Henry Clay of Kentucky, hammered together a plan. Maine was admitted as the 23rd state - a free state. Missouri was admitted as the 24th state, a slave state. All restrictions on slavery in Missouri were removed, but in the future slavery was to be banned in the territories north of a line drawn along the southern boundary of Missouri extending to the west coast. Basically, this was an issue of states' rights, which of course was not settled until another generation did so - on the field of battle in the Civil War.

The producer of A Moment In Time is Steve Clark. At the University of Richmond, this is Dan Roberts.

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