Congressional HIstory I

No, the land beneath Washington was not a swamp.

Average population per House district by census year:

1810....36,377
1860..122,614
1910..210,583  -- size of House reaches 435, and stays there
1960..410,481
2010..709,760

Until the 17th Amendment, state legislatures chose US senators.

Congressional Tenure




"All of American history comes from the Civil War. It is the most important event in our history. Everything before it led up to it, everything since, everything, is a consequence of it." -- Ken Burns


From Article I, section 2

Representatives and direct Taxes shall be apportioned among the several States which may be included within this Union, according to their respective Numbers, which shall be determined by adding to the whole Number of free Persons, including those bound to Service for a Term of Years, and excluding Indians not taxed, three fifths of all other Persons.

Akhil Amar on the Three-Fifths Clause:

• Slaveholding states had additional House members;
• Many slave states skewed district maps in favor of slaveholding regions of the state;
• Additional House members meant more electoral votes.

Consequences -- From William Lee Miller, Arguing About Slavery:

• Five of the first seven presidents were slaveholders [Washington, Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, Jackson].
• For 50 of the presidency's first 64 years, the chief executive was a slaveholder. 
• For 28 of the House's first 35 years, the speaker was a slaveholder
• The Senate's president pro tem was usually a slaveholder.
• Most cabinet members and Supreme Court justices were slaveholders.
• Slaveholder Andrew Jackson named slaveholding Roger Taney to succeed slaveholding John Marshall to serve as chief justice.

John F. Kennedy and Profiles in Courage

• Ted Sorensen wrote much of it, probably most of it.
• JFK was thinking about running for president, and in the mid-1950s, a Democrat needed the South.  Map of 1956 election: 

Adams

• Embargo: In 1807,  Jefferson asked Congress to embargo Britain as retaliation for British aggression against US merchant ships. The embargo hurt the Massachusetts economy.
• Odd parallel to JFK's own life.
• The House picks Adams in 1824
• The myth of the whisper spot
• The Gag Rule

Territorial Expansion and Slavery



Calhoun denounces the "all men are created equal" line in the Declaration

Compromise of 1850:

• California admitted as a free state; 
• The rest of the Mexican cession was divided into the territories of New Mexico and Utah and organized without mention of slavery; 
• The claim of Texas to part of New Mexico was satisfied by a payment of $10 million;
• Fugitive Slave Act was passed to apprehend runaway slaves and return them to their masters; and 
• Slave trade -- but not slavery -- was abolished in the District of Columbia.

Webster and Benton

• Chapter 4 opens by quoting Benton:  "I never quarrel, sir.  But sometimes I fight, sir; and whenever I fight, sir, a funeral follows, sir."

The Field of Blood by Joanne Freeman (PO `84)