anodynes and palliatives. History has demonstrated that Seward and Chase understood the nature of the distemper and read the future, which Clay and Webster did not. This time, however, the old statesmen were still to have their way.
On February 13 President Taylor had laid before Congress the Constitution of California. On the 14th Foote of Mississippi had offered in the Senate a resolution to refer the case of California and all pending propositions concerning slavery, among them Clay's resolutions and a similar set introduced by Bell of Tennessee, to a select committee of thirteen Senators who were to report a plan of settlement. Foote's resolution, withdrawn once and then renewed after two months of debate, embracing the whole slavery question, was adopted on April 18. Clay was elected chairman of the committee, which had among its members the foremost men of the Senate, excluding however the leading representatives of the anti-slavery sentiment. On May 8 the committee submitted a report consisting of three bills and an elaborate argument.
Clay's course with regard to the admission of California had been very unsteady. His resolutions embodying his “comprehensive plan of adjustment” were certainly open to the construction that all the essential points contained in them were, as parts of a great compromise, to form one legislative measure. But when the Constitution of California was received, Clay declared himself
