Historical Timeline

1846	The House of Representatives adopts the Wilmot Proviso.  This Proviso would bar slavery from any territory acquired from Mexico, however, the Senate rejects this proviso.
1850	Its population swelled by the recent Gold Rush, California is admitted into the union as a free state.
1850	In return for California's free state standing, slaveholders in the South are granted a stringent Fugitive Slave Law for the recapture of runaways.