5
The Dispute over Slavery,
Secession, and the Civil War
A
lready the nation was reeling. On August 8 , 1846 , a young,
impetuous, ruddy-complexioned freshman member of the House
of Representatives by the name of David Wilmot, rose in the chamber
and proposed a Proviso to an appropriations bill. The Wilmot Proviso
took everyone by surprise. It stated “that, as an express and fundamen-
tal condition to the acquisition of any territory from the Republic of
Mexico... neither slavery nor involuntary servitude shall ever exist in
any part of said territory.” Wilmot claimed that he did not oppose slav-
ery where it already existed, as in Texas; but free territory, such as the
territory received from Mexico, was totally different. “God forbid,” he
declared, “that we should be the means of planting this institution
upon it.”
All hell broke loose in the House. Southerners expected to take
their slaves into a territory they had done so much to acquire. They
raved and ranted in the heated debates over passage of the Wilmot
Proviso, threatening secession. The House became one continuous riot
of angry and frustrated men who frequently ended their outbursts with
challenges to meet on the dueling ground.
Southerners tried to block passage of the Proviso, but it passed in
the House by a vote of 80 to 64. In the Senate, however, where south-
erners had greater voting strength, they killed it. Session after session
during the next several years the Proviso won passage in the House and