‘The Great Compromiser’: The Forgotten Legacy of Henry Clay

A detail from "The United States Senate, A.D. 1850," circa 1855, drawn by Peter F. Rothermel and engraved by Robert Whitechurch. Library of Congress. Henry Clay, "the Great Compromiser," introduces the Compromise of 1850 in his last significant act as a senator. Public Domain

In the movie “To Kill a Mockingbird,” an angry Scout Finch returns home from her first morning at school. She’s upset that her teacher wants her to stop learning to read every night with her father, Atticus. In tears, she refuses to go back to school, at which point Atticus, a prominent attorney in town, takes her into his arms and says of the teacher: “You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view, until you climb inside of his skin and walk around in it.”

“But if I keep going to school,” Scout says, “we can’t ever read anymore.”

“Scout,” asks Atticus, “do you know what a compromise is?”

“Bending the law?”

Atticus pauses a moment, no doubt amused by this interpretation, and then says: “No, it’s an agreement reached by mutual consent. Now, here’s the way it works. You concede the necessity of going to school, we’ll keep right on reading the same every night just as we always have. Is that a bargain?”

Compromise.

Sometimes that can be a tough proposition, so much so that it’s a word we rarely hear in today’s politically charged atmosphere. Some may even regard compromise as a sign of weakness. Yet one American politician, Henry Clay (1777–1852), became so adept at resolving crises by mutual consent that he became known as “The Great Compromiser.” Even today, more than 150 years after his death, that honorific belongs to him alone among all American politicians.

A Life in Brief

A portrait of Henry Clay, 1821, by Charles Bird King. Oil on canvas. National Gallery of Art, Washington. Public Domain

Unlike his fellow Virginians James Madison and Thomas Jefferson, Henry Clay received a minimal formal education. In his eulogy to Clay on July 6, 1852, and no doubt thinking of his own adolescence, fellow Kentuckian Abraham Lincoln said: “Mr. Clay’s lack of a more perfect early education, however it may be regretted generally, teaches at least one profitable lesson; it teaches that in this country, one can scarcely be so poor, but that, if he will, he can acquire sufficient education to get through the world respectably.”

After reading the law with the eminent George Wythe in Richmond, Clay was licensed to practice law at age 20, but he soon left Virginia and followed his family to Kentucky. This move was critical to his political destiny for while he was an outsider among the prestigious Virginian families, he was at liberty to make a name for himself in Kentucky.

So he did. Over the next half century, Clay served in both the Senate and the House of Representatives, where he held the position of speaker longer than any other House member other than Sam Rayburn. He ran for president three times, lost each attempt, and served as secretary of state under John Quincy Adams. On his death, he was the first American to lie in state in the Capitol Rotunda. Countless grateful Americans turned out to view his funeral procession from Washington to Lexington, Kentucky, via railroad and steamboat.

Like all human beings, Clay had flaws and imperfections of character. He owned slaves. In his younger years, he gambled. He sometimes allowed his temper to get the best of him. He was at times unfaithful to his wife. He was a mediocre secretary of state.

A portrait of Henry Clay and his wife, Lucretia Hart Clay, on their 50th wedding anniversary, probably 1849, by E. Anthony. Library of Congress. Public Domain

Yet in his service to his country, Clay brought a wealth of gifts. To the Supreme Court, he introduced the amicus brief, which is a written submission, often by an expert without direct interest in the case, that can help the court come to a decision. Some of the cases that he argued before that high court are still cited today, evidence of his keen grasp of the law and the Constitution.

But it was as a member of Congress and later a senator that four of Clay’s contributions in particular helped shape and preserve the United States.

The American System

Following the War of 1812, Clay led the way in establishing a system whereby the federal government could assist the growing country. The tripartite approach included the use of tariffs to grow American industries, the creation of a national bank to aid in commerce, and granting federal subsidies for roads and canals to help unify the country and assist farmers bringing goods to market.

The Missouri Compromise of 1820

A map of the Missouri Compromise of 1820 from "McConnell's Historical Maps of the United States," 1919. Library of Congress. Public Domain

Though a slaveholder, Clay well understood the loathing of many people, particularly in the North, for the spread of slavery. As the United States expanded west, there was growing turmoil over whether prospective states would be free or slave. When a crisis arose over the admission of Missouri and Maine to the Union—Union as in a non-divided America—Clay displayed his genius for compromise, bringing together disparate members of Congress into an agreement that satisfied most Americans. Under his leadership, Missouri was admitted as a slave state while Maine would be free of slaves, and in the future all new states north of Missouri’s southern border would become free-soil states.

Though slavery remained the great dividing line in American politics for the next 40 years, Clay’s skilled negotiations prevented what might have been a catastrophic crisis for the new nation.

The Nullification Crisis

Like slavery, tariffs worked to divide North and South. Northerners welcomed tariffs to protect their infant industries from foreign competition, whereas the more agrarian South felt penalized by paying higher prices for goods. Opposed to the Tariff of 1832, South Carolina’s government declared it nullified, an act that could well throw the Union into civil war.

President Andrew Jackson threatened military action to force the state’s compliance. He even ordered his secretary of defense to prepare troops to enter South Carolina. This crisis threatened to divide and destroy the Union.

Working with Senator John C. Calhoun of South Carolina, and behind the scenes with President Jackson, Clay shaped the more moderate Tariff of 1833, whose provisions proved agreeable to both sides. Once again, Clay’s abilities as a negotiator steered the country away from a major crisis.

The Compromise of 1850

"The United States Senate, A.D. 1850," circa 1855, drawn by Peter F. Rothermel and engraved by Robert Whitechurch. Library of Congress. Henry Clay, "the Great Compromiser," introduces the Compromise of 1850 in his last significant act as a senator. Public Domain

When the Mexican-American War ended in 1848, it left the United States with vast new western territories. As in 1820, a debate erupted over whether the new lands would be free or slave. Resolution of that question would determine control of Congress and the government in the future.

Burdened with the afflictions of age and ill-health, Clay nonetheless took up this challenge. After much time and effort, he worked with Stephen Douglas to propose a series of laws, such as admitting California as a free state, strengthening the fugitive slave laws, and allowing voters in the territories of Utah and New Mexico to later determine whether to permit slavery.

Though the Compromise of 1850 left many Americans unhappy, it took hold, and Clay went to his grave believing that he had again prevented a national catastrophe. However, slavery was now front and center as the issue of the age. Firebrands on both sides whipped up bitter feelings between the North and the South. Clay’s final act of devotion to the Union proved only a temporary respite from the nation’s march to civil war.

The Bridge Builder’s Tools

How was Henry Clay so successful at the arts of compromise on a national scale?

A formal campaign portrait of Whig presidential candidate Henry Clay, circa 1843, by John Sartain after the painting by John Neagle. Library of Congress. Public Domain

His personal charm and talents helped immensely. Even in an age of powerful orators, Clay stood triumphant. The power of his near-hypnotic voice and reasoned arguments swayed the hearts and minds of his listeners. Citing numerous contemporary accounts of his speaking prowess, one historian wrote: “His voice was a magnificent instrument to express his emotions and ideas, remarkable clear, at times ’soft as a lute‘ and other times ’full as a trumpet,' beautifully modulated.”

Clay’s ardent belief in the possibility and worth of compromise surely aided him as well in these seemingly quixotic quests. Many men give themselves over to a cause so completely that they become blind to the possibility of compromise. Not so for Henry Clay.

In his old age, as he battled once again to bring opponents together in the Compromise of 1850, Clay gave us the heart of his credo: “I go for honorable compromise whenever it can be made. Life itself is but a compromise between death and life, the struggle continuing throughout our whole existence, until the great Destroyer finally triumphs. All legislation, all government, all society, is formed upon the principle of mutual concession, politeness, comity, courtesy; upon these, everything is based. … Compromise is peculiarly appropriate among the members of a republic, as of one common family.”

“Congressional Scales, A True Balance,” 1850, by N. Currier. Library of Congress. A satire on President Zachary Taylor's attempts to balance Southern and Northern interests on slavery in 1850 with several members of Congress below, including Henry Clay on the left dish. Public Domain

Just as strong was his devotion to the Union. Even some who opposed Clay politically recognized his love for the American Republic. In the same eulogy cited earlier, Abraham Lincoln, who regarded Clay as one of his exemplars, quoted at length from a eulogy written in a journal politically opposed to Clay. It included this pertinent observation: “As on a question of liberty, he knew no North, no South, no East, no West, but only the Union, which held them all in its sacred circle.”

Henry Clay "Faithful Even Unto Death" memorial ribbon, circa 1852. Cornell University Collection of Political Americana, Cornell University Library. Public Domain

In his 2024 article “America, It Seems More and More, Could Use a Politician Like Henry Clay Again,” Glenn W. Lafantasie notes: “Clay was committed not only to the principle of compromise but also to the idea of Union. Yet, like many Westerners (including Abraham Lincoln) and Americans in general, Clay’s adherence to the Union came less from an ideological commitment to Union as a political idea and more from a visceral, emotional love for the Union as a unique thing in the world. Nowhere else in the world could such a federation of separate provinces (practically nations in their own right) be found. At the simplest level, the Union was something historical and something tangible, something to be loved with one’s heart, not with one’s head.”

To love our country with our hearts and to aim for unity by way of “mutual concession, politeness, comity, courtesy”: these lessons from Henry Clay are worth remembering in our present age of division and rancor.

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