The Mexican-American War expanded America’s borders — but it also cracked its soul. In 1850, Washington’s elder statesmen tried to stitch the nation back together with words: Henry Clay, John C. Calhoun, Daniel Webster… and a rising Mississippi senator named Jefferson Davis. Their Compromise was supposed to save the Union — instead, it shackled it.

In this immersive episode, Jeffrey Newman takes you inside the fevered debates of Congress, the fury of the Fugitive Slave Act, and the secret world of the Underground Railroad.
Follow the lives of those who defied the law to keep the promise of liberty alive — Harriet Tubman, William Still, Ellen and William Craft, and the countless unnamed souls who built freedom mile by mile in the dark.
Then step into the flickering firelight of Civil War-era Halloween — where soldiers carved turnips into lanterns, families turned to séances for comfort, and a haunted nation whispered to its dead.

From compromise to conscience, from courtroom to campfire — this is the story of a country bargaining with its own soul.

Featured themes:

• The Compromise of 1850: five laws, one fatal illusion

• Jefferson Davis’ political ascent and the seeds of secession

• The brutal enforcement of the Fugitive Slave Act

• True accounts from the Underground Railroad

• The two Harriets — Tubman and Beecher Stowe — and the fire they lit

• Lincoln’s moral awakening as the Whig Party collapses

• Halloween traditions during the Civil War (A little holiday fun)

Next Episode: Polarization and the Death of Moderation — Whigs, Democrats, and the Free Soil Revolt.

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