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Conference Committee Report on the Missouri Compromise
March 1, 1820
Courtesy of National Archives, Center for Legislative Archives
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The conference committee report suggests an amendment to a bill that would eventually be passed as the "Missouri Compromise." To keep the balance of free and slave states equal, the Compromise admitted Missouri to the Union as a slave state and Maine as a non-slave state. It also prohibited slavery in the remainder of the Louisiana Territory above the 36 degree 30 minute latitude line.
The Committee of Conference of the Senate and of the House of Representatives on the subject of the disagreeing votes of the Two Houses, upon the Bill entitled an "Act for the admission of the State of Maine into the Union --
Report the following Resolution
Resolved.
1st That they recommend to the Senate to recede from their amendments to the said Bill.
2nd That they recommend to the two Houses to agree to strike out of the fourth section of the Bill from the House of Representatives now pending in the Senate, entitled an "Act to authorize the people of the Missouri Territory to form a Constitution and State Government and for the admission of such State into the Union upon an equal footing with the original states" the following proviso in the following words -- and shall ordain and establish that there shall be neither slavery nor involuntary servitude otherwise than in the punishment of crimes whereof the party shall have been duly convicted: provided always, that any person escaping into the same from whom labour or service is lawfully claimed in any other state, such fugitives may be lawfully reclaimed and conveyed to the person claiming his or her labour or service, as aforesaid: Provided never the less, that the said Provision shall not be construed to alter the condition or civil rights of any person now held to service or labour in the said Territory --
And that the following provision be added to the Bill --
And be it further enacted that in all that Territory ceded by France to the United States under the name of Louisiana, which lies north of thirty six degrees and thirty minutes north latitude not included within the limits of the state contemplated by this act, Slavery and involuntary servitude otherwise than in the punishment of crimes whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall be and is hereby forever prohibited -- Provided that any person escaping into the same from whom labour or service is lawfully claimed in any other State or Territory of the United States, such fugitives may be lawfully reclaimed, and conveyed to the person claiming his or her labour or service as aforesaid.
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