The Civil War was the result of a series of political crimes and blunders of which both sections of the country were equally guilty. It was not inevitable or necessary to fight in order to abolish slavery. In every other country of the world slavery had been abolished without war. The question of slavery had never been a party issue until after the Mexican War, but from then until the election of 1860 slavery was the leading political issue. During the war with Mexico, Wilmot, of Pennsylvania, offered what is known as the Wilmot Proviso, which provided that the territory acquired from Mexico should be closed to slavery. Although this bill was defeated in Congress it brought up the question of the further extension of slavery. At the time of the Mexican War there were two national parties--the Whigs and the Democrats. These two parties embraced almost all of the people, and as both were strong in both sections of the United States, they tended to cement the union, for parties on a national basis tend to unify a nation while sectional parties lead to disunion. The anti-slavery people and the moderates gravitated towards the Whig party while the pro-slavery people gravitated towards the Democratic party. The Whigs elected General Zachary Taylor President in 1848. Although he was a large slave holder of Louisiana, he was a moderate, and was satisfactory to all groups and sections. He had the support of Lincoln as well as of the southern Whigs. Soon after Taylor became President, Henry Clay proposed the famous Compromise of 1850, the important features of which were: admit California as a free state, organize the remainder of the territory taken from Mexico without regard to slavery, abolish the slave trade in the District of Columbia, and pass a fugitive slave law to be enforced by the federal government. This compromise, although a Whig measure, was instrumental in killing the Whig party. No party or section was satisfied with it. President Taylor opposed it but his death before its passage brought to the presidency the Vice-President, Fillmore, who allowed it to become a law without his signature. The provision that broke up the Whig party was the strict fugitive slave law, and anti-slavery Whigs repudiated their party. The idea of returning fugitive slaves was shocking to the best moral judgment of the time. The leaders of moral sentiment--ministers, poets, and reformers of every type--advised disobedience. It was a dead letter because the moral sentiment of the age was against it. On the other hand, the pro-slavery people did not like it because it was not enforced. Thus the law was treated with contempt by both parties. The Whig party which was moderate, national, opposed to expansion, and the extension of slavery was disrupted. The Democrats carried all except four states in 1852, and remained in power until 1860, dominated by powerful pro-slavery sentiment throughout this period.