Presidential aspirant, but
he was a true lover of his country, and seldom have the traits of
politician and patriot worked together more effectively. Though the mass
of the Northern members, strengthened doubtless by the influence of
their constituents at home during the recess, were now opposed to the
whole compromise, and a few Southern extremists were against it, yet
the majority of both House and Senate were won to its support, and on
the last day of February, 1821, Missouri was admitted as a slave State,
on condition that she expunge her exclusion of free blacks, which she
promptly did. Maine had already been admitted. The excitement ended
almost as suddenly as it had begun.

CHAPTER IV

THE WIDENING RIFT

For the next twelve years, slavery was in the background of the national
stage. But during this period, various influences were converging to a
common result, until in 1832-3 the issue was defined with new clearness
and thenceforth grew as the central feature in the public life of
America.

From the time of the Missouri debate, the slavery interest was
consolidated and alert, even while other subjects seemed to fill the
public mind. To the North, slavery was habitually a remote matter, but
it was perpetually brought home to the business and bosoms of the South.
The whole industrial system, a social aristocracy, and political
ambition, blended their forces. An instance of the subtle power of the
institution was given in a little-marked incident of Adams's generally
creditable administration. By three men as high-minded as President
Adams, Secretary Clay, and Minister Gallatin, overtures were made to
England for a treaty by which the surrender of deserters from her army
and navy should be her compensation for surrendering our fugitive
slaves! The British government would not listen to the proposal.

The national politics of this period, 1820-32, centred in a group of
strong and picturesque personalities,--Clay, Adams, Calhoun, Jackson,
and Webster. John Quincy Adams was a sort of exaggeration of the typical
New Englander,--upright, austere, highly educated, devoted to the public
service, ambitious, yet not to the sacrifice of conscience, but cold,
angular, repellant. Says Carl Schurz in his _Henry Clay_--a book which
gives an admirable resume of a half-century of politics: "He possessed
in the highest degree that uprightness which leans backward. He had a
horror of demagogy, and lest he should render