What did the Missouri Compromise of 1820 accomplish?

The Missouri Compromise admitted Missouri as a slave state and Maine as a free state, preserving the balance between free and slave states in the Senate. It also set the 36°30′ line, with slavery generally prohibited in the Louisiana Purchase territory north of that boundary. Thus, it created a dividing line between free and slave states. The Fugitive Slave Law came later, as part of the Compromise of 1850.

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