For my research project I’ve decided to study in greater detail the Missouri Compromise of 1820. Briefly the compromise was an attempted solution to quell dissidence between the southern and northern states over the issue of slavery. The details of the compromise stated that Maine would be admitted to the union as a free state and Missouri as a slave state thus protecting the balance of slavery in the United States. While the compromise did fulfill it’s function as a stop gap measure in retrospect it only delayed the inevitable.
Sources- http://www.loc.gov/rr/program/bib/ourdocs/Missouri.html