Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly volume 15.djvu/147



Why did the Northern Democracy so suddenly present that "apple of discord" —the Wilmot proviso—to the Southern Democracy in August of 1846?

Von Holst answers this question with the rather vague assertion that the "vox populi of the North" compelled the politicians to take some action against the proposed increase of slave soil through the proposed Mexican cession. Wilson in his "Slave Power" attributes the proviso to "several Democratic members" of Congress, who had been "cajoled into a vote for [Texan] annexation," and now, unable to retrieve the past, sought in this way "to save the future." Schouler makes no assertion as to its origin. Garrison in his volume of the American Nation series contents himself with the statement: "The circumstances of its origin suggest, if no more, that its introduction was simply a maneuver for political advantage in a family quarrel among the Democrats."