Task #1: Write two or three sentences explaining why this event is important and how it affected America. Be sure to write your answers in your own words and do not copy directly from the websites.

Task #2:
Explain why you believe American might be different if this event had not occurred.

List of important events in American History:

1820 – Missouri Compromise

1820 – Maine becomes a state

1820 – U. S. presidential election, James Monroe re-elected president, Daniel D. Tompkins vice-president.

Pro- and Anti-Slavery Factions in Congress

When the Missouri Territory first applied for statehood in 1818, it was clear that many in the territory wanted to allow slavery in the new state. Part of the more than 800,000 square miles bought from France in the Louisiana Purchase in 1803, it was known as the Louisiana Territory until 1812, when it was renamed to avoid confusion with the newly admitted state of Louisiana.

Missouri’s bid to become the first state west of the Mississippi River, and to allow slavery within its borders, set off a bitter debate in a Congress that was—like the nation itself—already divided into pro- and anti-slavery factions. In the North, where abolitionist sentiment was growing, many people opposed the extension of the institution of slavery into new territory, and worried that adding Missouri as a slave state would upset the balance that currently existed between slave and free states in the Union. Pro-slavery Southerners, meanwhile, argued that new states, like the original 13, should be given the freedom to choose whether to permit slavery or not.

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