Democratic (constitutionalist) President Buchanan signs the (protective) Morrill Tariff Act, raising import duties from between 15 and 24%, up to 47%.  For years the agricultural free trade, slave States had resisted high tariffs because they paid most of the tariffs; while the industrial protectionist, free States favored a higher tariff, because they would fund “interval improvements” (corporate welfare) in the northern States.  But now the southern States no longer have members of Congress there to vote against it.

     NOTE: The act passed the Senate by a vote of (YEA, 25; NAY, 14).  If the abstentions of the seven seceded Confederate States had been counted as NO votes, the act would have failed by a vote of (NAY, 28; YEA, 25).

       [updated 1/25/2025]

       A lawfully elected Senate (in accordance with Article I, Section 3 [Clause 1]) passes, and sends on to the States for ratification the Corwin Amendment which would prohibit Congress from proposing any amendment that would abolish slavery.

       NOTE: Had this amendment passed, and Gulf States returned to the Union they would have had an ironclad guarantee that slavery would not have been abolished without their consent.  There must have been some other factor (free trade?) that compelled them to secede.

      [updated 1/25/2025]