Abraham Lincoln
Responses to Moderator’s Questions
“What is your opinion regarding the Compromise of 1850?”
“Well, I feel that the Compromise was an excellent decision for Mr. Clay to make. Not only did it resolve many issues that had come to divide the North and the South, but it was also beneficial for both.”
“Do you feel the Compromise of 1850 was beneficial?”
“Yes, both the North and the South benefited from it. The North gained California as a free state, the South gained no slave restrictions in both Utah and New Mexico territories, such was to be decided by popular sovereignty. Slave trade was prohibited in Washington D.C. but slaveholding in the area was allowed. Texas loses the boundary dispute with New Mexico but gains 10 million dollars. All in all, the Compromise was fair and giving to everyone in the Union.”
“What are your feelings on Popular Sovereignty and the consequences that have resulted from it, such as Bleeding Kansas?”
“Popular Sovereignty may have been created for the people and by the people, but it does not help the people. It unconstitutional and has sparked many violent and chaotic results that have only helped to divide our nation further. Bleeding Kansas is perhaps the most obvious of these violent consequences. Not only did Bleeding Kansas present that our nation had divided into two, a North and South, it provoked the two sides into a state of war. With good hearted men from the same House fighting against each other over something as a little as whether Kansas was to be a slave or free state. Frankly, our nation cannot be divided or it will fall, we will no longer be the country of free men…the country that is to serve as an example to look up to by foreign nations…we will be the nation that collapsed on its own foundation…the nation to pity.. and I will not stand for that. Popular sovereignty is the fuel to the fire that is