without any restriction as to slavery, and a proposition to Texas of a northern and western boundary with a compensation in money; the second, originally drawn by Mason of Virginia, provided for the capture and delivery of fugitive slaves; and the third bill prohibited the introduction of slaves from adjacent states into the District of Columbia for sale, or to be placed in depot for the purpose of subsequent sale or transportation to other and distant markets. The report also contained a declaration that any new states to be formed out of the territory of Texas should, when fit for admission, be received with or without slavery, as their constitutions might determine. There had been grave disagreements in the committee. Scarcely any member was fully satisfied with the report; but the accompanying argument promised that the adoption of the measures submitted would effect an amicable settlement of all the pending controversies, and “give general satisfaction to an overwhelming majority of the people of the United States.”
But no sooner was the first of the three bills, on account of the multiplicity of its subjects derisively called “the Omnibus Bill,” before the Senate, than it turned out that the combination of different propositions in one measure, apparently necessary to give the bill the character of a compromise, was also an element of weakness. There were those who would vote for the admission of California, but not for the territorial governments
