Henry Clay

'The Great Compromiser' built the Missouri Compromise of 1820 as Speaker and, as a senator, the Compromise Tariff of 1833 that ended the nullification crisis and the Compromise of 1850, an omnibus package that Stephen Douglas finally passed in separate bills after Clay's version failed. Clay's method, bundling concessions to North and South, postponed civil war for decades. The counterargument is moral: each compromise preserved and extended slavery, and the 1850 deal included the Fugitive Slave Act.