Sold – Presidet Fillmore Has Faith That the North Will Come Around and Support

The controversy over slavery had divided the nation and by 1850 threatened to tear it asunder. The Compromise of 1850 was proposed as a solution and consisted of a package of measures providing that California would be admitted to the Union as a free state, New Mexico and Utah would be organized and given the right to decide on slavery for themselves, and the slave trade (but not slavery) would be ended in Washington, D. C. Most controversial of all was the Fugitive Slave Law, which would make it much easier for southerners to reclaim runaway slaves. The provisions provided that Federal commissioners be appointed who could force northerners to assist them in capturing blacks under penalty of imprisonment, and denied blacks accused of being runaway slaves jury trials and the right to defend themselves. These commissioners were to be paid for every black sent south into slavery,  which invited corruption, so free blacks in the north would live in terror of being kidnapped under the law and enslaved. President Taylor was opposed to these statutes, saw them as troublesome, and stated that he would veto them. Vice President Fillmore was in favor, believing that the compromise was necessary to save the union.Then Taylor died and Fillmore had the opportunity to sign the bills himself as president, which he did. He believed he had helped to safeguard the Union, but it soon became clear that the compromise, rather than satisfying anyone, gave everyone something to dislike. Dissatisfaction in the north increased when Fillmore sent commissioners to northern cities to drag blacks back south, and supported treason charges against whites helping blacks escape in opposition to the Fugitive Slave Law. Incidents like these convinced many northerners that Fillmore was appeasing the south and he lost much of his popularity there. Under the strains of the failing compromise, the Whig Party began to come apart at the seams.

Autograph Letter Signed as President, 2 pages, Washington, May 8, 1851, to Hon. J. Bell (most likely Tennessee’s U.S. Senator John Bell, a Whig and ally of Fillmore), Washington, showing that he remained convinced that his fellow northerners would come around to his way of thinking eventually, and was not phased by their opposition. “…I regret indeed that I did not have the pleasure of seeing you before you left, but the truth is that I have been, and still am, run down with calls, and every day many go away without my being able to see them. This is sometimes very painful, as I cannot discriminate without giving just cause of offence, and my time is often occupied by matters of the most trifling importance, with which I have nothing to do, and I am thereby prevented from seeing persons whom I greatly desire to see, and on business of the greatest importance. But every man feels that he is entitled to his turn, and I can never know until he gets in what his business is, and generally those having the least, are most reluctant to leave. But you know all this and must feel that I am more deserving of your pity than your anger for any apparent neglect. You have too many proofs of my sincere respect and esteem to ever doubt my friendship, and I am sure I have not doubted yours. I feel much anxiety about the result in your state. It will be regarded as a test of the administration measures. The true Union Whigs are gaining in the North. I have accepted an invitation to attend the opening of the N.Y. and Erie R.R. and shall have an opportunity to witness something of the feelings of the community in the strongest Free Soil portion of the state.”

Fillmore mis-read the mood  of the nation and of his Whig Party in particular, as it was fragmenting over the slavery dispute. In 1852, in what was to prove the Whig’s final presidential campaign, the potential nominees were Fillmore, Daniel Webster, and General Winfield Scott. Fillmore was, despite the optimism shown in this letter, unpopular with northerners; Webster was aged, unwell and also suffered from having supported the compromise; and Scott was disliked by Southern Whigs for serving as President Jackson’s personal emissary in 1832 when Jackson threatened to use federal troops in South Carolina in a tariff and secession dispute. Scott was nominated but had no chance to be elected. Two years later, northern Whigs with some anti-slavery Democrats, formed the Republican Party. The conflict Fillmore had sought to avoid was that much closer.