2 Congressional Leaders More Important Than Presidents
Henry Clay and John C. Calhoun, 1820s through the 1850s
Henry Clay of Kentucky: the Great Compromiser, and Leader of the Whig Party. John C. Calhoun of South Carolina, Vice President for Opposing Presidents and Powerful Advocate of State’s Rights, Slavery.
Mr. Beat explains how Henry Clay, concerned that President Andrew Jackson acted too much like a king and claimed too much executive power, formed the Whig political party in the early 1930s. It lasted a little over two decades, and attracted many prominent Americans, including a young lawyer in Illinois by the name of Abraham Lincoln. But the party divided bitterly over the 1854 Kansas-Nebraska Act, which effectively repealed the Missouri Compromise of 1820 and the Compromise of 1850 by allowing slavery in northern territories.
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