On This Day
1850 – Henry Clay introduces the Compromise of 1850 to the U.S. Congress.[4]
The Compromise of 1850 was a package of five separate bills passed by the United States Congress in September 1850 that defused a political confrontation between slave and free states on the status of territories acquired in the Mexican–American War. It also set Texas’s western and northern borders and included provisions addressing fugitive slaves and the slave trade. The compromise was brokered by Whig senator Henry Clay and Democratic senator Stephen A. Douglas, with the support of President Millard Fillmore.
A debate over slavery in the territories had erupted during the Mexican–American War, as many Southerners sought to expand slavery to the newly-acquired lands and many Northerners opposed any such expansion. The debate was further complicated by Texas’s claim to all former Mexican territory north and east of the Rio Grande, including areas it had never effectively controlled. These issues prevented the passage of organic acts to create organized territorial governments for the land acquired in the Mexican–American War. In early 1850, Clay proposed a package of eight bills that would settle most of the pressing issues before Congress. Clay’s proposal was opposed by President Zachary Taylor, anti-slavery Whigs like William Seward, and pro-slavery Democrats like John C. Calhoun, and congressional debate over the territories continued. The debates over the bill were the most famous in Congressional history, and the divisions devolved into fistfights and drawn guns on the floor of Congress.
After Taylor died and was succeeded by Fillmore, Douglas took the lead in passing Clay’s compromise through Congress as five separate bills. Under the compromise, Texas surrendered its claims to present-day New Mexico and other states in return for federal assumption of Texas’s public debt. California was admitted as a free state, while the remaining portions of the Mexican Cession were organized into New Mexico Territory and Utah Territory. Under the concept of popular sovereignty, the people of each territory would decide whether or not slavery would be permitted. The compromise also included a more stringent Fugitive Slave Law and banned the slave trade in Washington, D.C. The issue of slavery in the territories would be re-opened by the Kansas–Nebraska Act, but the Compromise of 1850 played a major role in postponing the American Civil War.
1907 – Charles Curtis of Kansas becomes the first Native American U.S. Senator.[8]
Charles Curtis (January 25, 1860 – February 8, 1936) was an American attorney and Republican politician from Kansas who served as the 31st vice president of the United States from 1929 to 1933. He also previously served as the Senate Majority Leader from 1924 to 1929.
A member of the Kaw Nation born in the Kansas Territory, Curtis was the first person with any Native American ancestry and with acknowledged non-European ancestry to reach either of the highest offices in the federal executive branch. He is the highest-ranking enrolled Native American ever to serve in the federal government. He is the most recent Executive Branch officer to have been born in a territory rather than a state or federal district.
Based on his personal experience, Curtis believed that Indians could benefit from mainstream education and assimilation. Curtis entered political life when he was 32 years old and won several terms from his district in Topeka, Kansas, beginning in 1892 as a Republican to the United States House of Representatives. While serving as a Representative, Curtis sponsored and helped pass the Curtis Act of 1898; it extended the Dawes Act to the Five Civilized Tribes of Indian Territory. As such, it ended their self-government and provided for allotment of communal land to individual households of tribal members, after they were registered on official rolls. It limited their tribal courts and government. Any lands not allotted were to be considered surplus by the federal government, which sold plots to non-Natives. Implementation of this act completed the extinguishing of tribal land titles in Indian Territory, which prepared the larger territory to be admitted as the state of Oklahoma, which was done in 1907. The government tried to encourage Indians to accept individual citizenship and lands and to take up European-American culture. By the end of the 19th century, it had set up boarding schools for Indian children as another method of assimilation.
Curtis was elected to the US Senate first by the Kansas Legislature in 1906 and then by popular vote in 1914, 1920, and 1926. Curtis served one six-year term from 1907 to 1913 and then most of three terms from 1915 to 1929 (after his election as vice president). His long popularity and connections in Kansas and national politics helped make Curtis a strong leader in the Senate; he marshaled support to be elected as Republican Whip from 1915 to 1924 and then as Senate Majority Leader from 1924 to 1929. In these positions, he was instrumental in managing legislation and accomplishing Republican national goals.
Curtis ran for vice president with Herbert Hoover as president in 1928. They won a landslide victory. When they ran together again in 1932, during the Great Depression, the public elected Democrats Franklin D. Roosevelt and John Nance Garner in a subsequent landslide.
Read more ->
Born On This Day
1881 – Alice Catherine Evans, American microbiologist (d. 1975)[34]
Alice Catherine Evans (January 29, 1881 – September 5, 1975) was an American microbiologist.[1] She became a researcher at the US Department of Agriculture. There she investigated bacteriology in milk and cheese. She later demonstrated that Bacillus abortus caused the disease brucellosis (undulant fever or Malta fever) in both cattle and humans.
Read more ->
FYI
The Marginalian by Maria Popova: Highlights in hindsight: favorite books of the past year
By Sara Prince, McKinsey & Company: Always connect, never give up: An interview with Jason Wright
As president of Washington’s football team, Wright is calling on his experiences as an NFL player, business school graduate, and McKinsey partner to change an entrenched culture.
By Kanoe Namahoe, Smart Brief: King of the road Why a criminal record shouldn’t be an instant “no”
By Emily Gregory, Crucial Skills: How to Tell an Employee They Talk Too Much
By Jae M. Rang, Proctor Gallagher Institute: The Most Common Word Used
Several years ago the New York Telephone Company made a detailed study of conversations to identify the most commonly used word. Can you guess what it would be?
The word was “I”, used 3,900 times in 500 conversations.
C’mon, when you see a group photo, whose picture do you look for first?
Read more ->
NASA: Astronomy Picture of the Day
Recipes
RecipeTinEats
- Coffee Cake with Cinnamon Streusel June 12, 2026Firstly, thank you for the Jaffle love. 🥰 Hit the Jaffle button above to see what he got up to today! Secondly – cake. Specifically, Coffee Cake! A classic crumb cake with a jammy cinnamon ribbon, loaded with lots and lots of nubbly, extra crunchy cinnamon streusel. Outrageously good. Coffee Cake with Cinnamon Streusel This... […]Nagi
- Introducing Jaffle! June 10, 2026Meet Jaffle! Future Chief Taste Tester. Son of a Dozer friend. A little bundle of golden, fluffy joy! 48 hours of instant happiness I didn’t expect to get a new puppy so soon after saying goodbye to Dozer. To be honest, I wasn’t sure when I’d be ready. And I had it in my head... […]Nagi
wikimedia
- Wikimedia Commons picture of the day for June 13 June 13, 2026Picture of the day An image of the Immaculate Heart of Mary on a stained-glass window located in a church in St. Peters, Missouri. Today is the feast day of the Immaculate Heart in the Roman Catholic Church.
- Wikimedia Commons picture of the day for June 12 June 12, 2026Picture of the day A memorial to victims of the Pulse nightclub shooting in front the Stonewall Inn in New York City. On June 12, 2016, a terrorist shot and killed 49 people and wounded 53 more in a mass shooting at Pulse, a gay nightclub in Orlando, Florida, USA.
E-book Deals:
The Book Junction: Where Readers Go To Discover Great New Fiction!
Mystery & Thriller Most Wanted
Book Blogs & Websites:
Welcome to the Stump the Bookseller blog!
Stump the Bookseller is a service offered by Loganberry Books to reconnect people to the books they love but can’t quite remember. In brief (for more detailed information see our About page), people can post their memories here, and the hivemind goes to work. After all, the collective mind of bibliophiles, readers, parents and librarians around the world is much better than just a few of us thinking. Together with these wonderful Stumper Magicians, we have a nearly 50% success rate in finding these long lost but treasured books. The more concrete the book description, the better the success rate, of course. It is a labor of love to keep it going, and there is a modest fee. Please see the How To page to find price information and details on how to submit your Book Stumper and payment.
Thanks to everyone involved to keep this forum going: our blogging team, the well-read Stumper Magicians, the many referrals, and of course to everyone who fondly remembers the wonder of books from their childhood and wants to share or revisit that wonder. Isn’t it amazing, the magic of a book?