The original idea was to do an omnibus bill, and give the southern pro-slavery and northern anti-slavery factions each some benefits, hoping everyone would vote for the whole package.
— Matt Glassman (@MattGlassman312) June 30, 2018
But the package never passed as an omnibus. As it turned out, many members cared more about preventing things they didn’t want than they did about getting things they did want. So there was little enthusiasm for the deal.
— Matt Glassman (@MattGlassman312) June 30, 2018
The trick to making the Compromise of 1850 work was the realization (by Douglas and others) that there was a small contingent that *did* like the compromise. Therefore, if you split the bill into its individual parts, those compromisers could vote each of the large blocks.
— Matt Glassman (@MattGlassman312) June 30, 2018
The point being: the vast majority of the House didn’t want the compromise, or at least didn’t want to vote for it. But broken into pieces, they didn’t have to. The single bills could produce the compromise, with only very few people voting for *all* the bills.
— Matt Glassman (@MattGlassman312) June 30, 2018
This is important to remember, because a lot of people intuitively think omnibus bills are the essence of compromise. But that’s not always the case.
— Matt Glassman (@MattGlassman312) June 30, 2018