This is just one example of a major controversy in American politics. This act created a division in the government, which was supposed to act as a compromise between the northern and southern sides in the civil war. This act was passed in both 1793 and 1850, which stated that "runaway slaves were to be returned to the state which they escaped from".
In the 1900s there was call for a major change in the way the government was ruling. There were changes in human rights and many other things.
