Hey there and welcome back to Heimler’s History. We’ve been going through Unit 4 of the AP U.S. History curriculum, and in this video it’s time to talk about politics and regional interests. So if you’re ready to get them brain cows milked, then baby, let’s get to it. So the main objective we’re trying to reach in this video is as follows. We need to figure out how to “explain how different regional interests affected debates about the role of the federal government in the early republic.” Translation: during this time there were national political interests and there were more regional political interests, and they often collided. So we’re going to try to figure out which interests were going to win out. So in the last video I talked about the War of 1812 and while it was certainly a national war, it put competing regional interests on full display. You might recall that the Federalists fiercely opposed this war going so far as to threaten secession in the New England area. However, America won the war and that led to a rising surge of nationalism in the collective American chest, and it made the Federalists look like a bunch of cotton-headed ninny-moggins, to use the scholarly historical term. But the war itself showed some glaring weaknesses in the United States. First, it made plain that without a National Bank, whose charter had expired in 1811, the U.S. lacked a reliable source of credit to raise funds. Second, the war showed how weak our systems of infrastructure and transportation was. This made it very difficult to move men and supplies during the war. And so riding in on his great horse of tariff imposition and infrastructure improvement, Henry Clay proposed his American System to remedy these problems and attempt to unify the national economy. So Clay’s American System was a set of policies that proposed the following. First, federally funded internal improvements like roads and canals. These would be to the benefit of farmers and merchants. Second, federal tariffs, which would protect U.S. manufacturers. Because tariffs, if you recall are taxes on imported goods. So if imported goods are more expensive, people are more likely to buy domestically made goods. Third, he proposed the Second Bank of the United States which would keep the economy purring with a national currency. Presidents Madison and Monroe both objected to the policies providing for roads and canals, and they did this, again, because of regional interests. Not only did they argue that such federal spending was an overreach of federal power, but they further argued that such spending would disadvantage the South. But by 1816 the other two policies, the tariffs and the National Bank, were solidly in place. Now, regional tensions were also exacerbated by westward expansion. Americans, as was their custom, were multiplying like rabbits, and thus the impulse to push westward in the frontier was still a thing. And so because of improved roads that made travel easier and cheap land being hawked by the federal government, Americans began settling the frontier in even greater numbers. Now on the questions of slavery, a bitter fight erupted when in 1819 Missouri applied for statehood in the Union. Settlers there had already brought thousands of enslaved people into the territory, and so it was assumed that Missouri would enter as a slave state. Now there were a couple reasons this raised everyone’s hackles. First, up to this point, there was a perfect balance in the Senate between slave states and free states: eleven free, and eleven slave. And this balance was of exceeding importance, especially to the southern states. In the House of Representatives, northern states had the majority because they had a larger population. But as long as this equal balance in the Senate was maintained, southerners could block any legislation that disadvantaged the South. So if Missouri entered as a slave state, this would decisively tip the balance of power in favor of the South over against the North. The second reason Missouri’s entry was a tense proposition was because of the Tallmadge Amendment. What’s the Tallmadge Amendment? I got you. The Tallmadge Amendment was proposed by New York congressman James Tallmadge. He proposed an amendment to Missouri’s application for statehood that would effectively ban slavery in the state after 25 years. And the vote on this, not surprisingly, fell right along party lines, and the southern senators were enraged by it because they saw it as an effort that, if passed, would eventually lead to the dissolution of slavery in all the states. For them, the balance of power in the nation was at stake, and they even threatened to secede from the Union over this issue. And so what happened? Well, here comes Henry Clay again to save the day with the Missouri Compromise, also known as the Compromise of 1820. Both of those are the same thing—don’t get confused. Basically this compromise provided for the following. Missouri would be admitted into the Union as a slave state. But they would also carve out a new state in New England called Maine and that would be a free state. Thus, the senate balance would be preserved. Second, the compromise established the 36° 30’ line as the boundary hereafter for slave and free states. Any territories above it would enter as free states (Missouri being excepted, of course) and any territories below it were eligible to enter as slave states. Thankfully, this calmed everyone down and maintained the balance of power that had been so carefully curated heretofore. Oh man, I’m so thankful that we’ll never have to deal with that issue again. Should I tell him? Nah, let’s wait.. Okay, that’s what you need to know about Unit 4 topic 3 of the AP U.S. History curriculum. If you need help getting an A in your class and a five on your exam in May, then you can If you want to know whether the issue of slavery will ever cause tension again in U.S. history, then subscribe and I’ll keep making these videos.