ROUGH AND READY. 467 between Texas and the Pacific Ocean was ceded to the United States, which agreed to pay Mexico. fifteen million dollars and to assume debts due American citizens by the Mexican government, to the amount of three and a half million dollars more. This treaty was ratified by Congress, and on the fourth of July, 1848, President Polk proclaimed peace. When the sixteenth national election approached, it was found that the Democratic party was hopelessly divided on the subject of slavery. Those favoring the "Wilmot Proviso," united with some of the Whigs in forming the "Free-Soil" Party, and nominated exPresident Van Buren for President. The other Democrats put forward Lewis Cass of Michigan, and the "Whigs," as the members of the opposite party were then called, nominated General Taylor of Kentucky, who had distinguished himself in the War of 1812, in the Seminole War, and was then fresh from the victory of Buena Vista. His "rough and ready manners, his success in arms and his irreproachable character combined to give him success at the polls, especially as he represented moderate views on the subject of slavery and was opposed to secession as a remedy for political evils. He was elected November, 1848. Before the election of President Taylor, and at almost the moment that the treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo was signed, a laborer turning up the soil of the territory then acquired by the United States, near the Sacramento River, for a mill race on the ranch of Colonel Suter, a Swiss emigrant, found particles of gold in his spade. The news of the discovery was rapidly carried throughout the world, and resulted in the speedy gathering of a motley population on our new western coast, in great material progress of the nation, and also in giving the new administration grave questions of policy to decide. So rapid was the growth of population on the Pacific coast that California was admitted to the Union but little over two years after the discovery of gold. STANDING ROCKS ON BRINK OF MU-AV CAÑON, COLORADO. CHAPTER XXIII. FROM COMPROMISE TO SECESSION. HE eleven years just preceding the Civil War THE were years of violent strife, both parliamentary and military. The discovery of gold in California, which had been reserved for the moment when that region had passed into the hands of the United States, caused a speedy massing of population on our new western coast, and in less than two years after the event, the population had risen from less than twenty thousand to nearly five times that number, a convention had been held at Monterey (September 1, 1849), which had formed a constitution prohibiting slavery, and application had been made for admission as a State. President Taylor informed Congress that he had advised the people of California to form a government, and that he recommended Congress to receive the Territory as a State under the Constitution then adopted. The discussion which followed showed that the subject of slavery was becoming more and more threatening to the stability of the Union. The exclusion of slavery from the newly acquired Territories was opposed by the representatives of the South; threats of disunion, such as had been heard all along through American history, became deep and frequent; two Southern States issued a call for a convention to frame a government for a "United States South;" and the country was thoroughly agitated. Large meetings were held in the North, not to propose disunion, as in past times, but to deprecate any further interference with slavery; an interference that seemed so threatening to the brotherhood of the States. Before the adoption of its Constitution by California, Kentucky had been engaged in revising its government, and there Henry Clay had made an effort to provide for the abolition of slavery, arguing that it was not the "blessing" that others claimed it to be; but his influence proved too weak to resist the opposition he encountered, though it was made apparent that he did not belong to the class beginning to be spoken of as "Fire Eaters." This action gave a premonition of the position that this peacemaker among statesmen was about to take in the absorbing debate. In one of the most eloquent speeches of his life, delivered in the presence of a crowded chamber, Mr. Clay proposed a compromise intended to settle all differences regarding slavery and the organization of the Territories. It was introduced into the Senate January 29, 1850, and, in its eight sections, provided for the admission of California without any restriction regarding slavery, that Territorial governments should be organized in the remainder of the districts acquired from Mexico without such restrictions, established the boundary of Texas and provided for her debt to a certain extent, prohibited the trade in slaves in the District of Columbia (but did not abolish slavery there), declared that Congress had not the power to |