Praxis II Citizenship

Answer: B - The Compromise of 1850 is most associated with the passage of the Fugitive Slave Act, the controversial legislation that ultimately led to free black Americans being conscripted into slavery if they were identified as or suspected of being runaway slaves (without due process of law affording them the opportunity to argue or prove that they were lawfully free). While the Compromise of 1850 was intended to ease sectional tension and avert civil war, the Fugitive Slave Act was particularly offensive to abolitionists and most Northern residents. It was ruled unconstitutional in Wisconsin in 1854, but that ruling was nullified by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1859. As a result, many runaway slaves ran past the North into Canada.