With Henry Clay's concessions, the Southern slave owners grew in power, and some of them even quit Congress in disappointment.

Chen Mo was very interested in one of them, so soon after Zachary Taylor was elected president, under the repeated invitations of Henry Clay, Chen Mo finally joined the Whig Party as a banker, and with his strong financial resources and bold bearing, he funded many Whig members who were excluded because of his opposition to slavery, and his popularity in the party increased rapidly.

Henry Clay didn't care too much about the debate about slavery within the party, and he only compromised with the southern slave owners in order to gain their support, win their votes, and achieve his goal of establishing a private central bank, so it was not surprising that Chen Mo, a big capitalist, opposed slavery.

As for Chen Mo's lavish funding of the Whigs, this is exactly what he wants.

Only when the Whigs are strong can he control more powerful forces, and Chen Mo's rising popularity did not make Henry Clay feel threatened.

Because the anti-slavery Whigs supported by Chen Mo actually only made up a small part of the party, and most of them were some weak young members with no background, the real core of the Whig Party, the elite members with great prestige and influence in Congress and the states, still closely surrounded him, and looked at him as the leader.

Although a considerable number of them were also opposed to slavery, because of their strength and influence, they were not as ostracized as the young Whigs who had no background, and Henry Clay's deliberate co-optation did not dissociate him from him because of his compromise on the issue of slavery.

Therefore, the entire Whig Party is still firmly in the hands of Henry Clay, and Chen Mo's actions are only a support and help for his fellow party members who share his political views, and he does not have too many interests with those core members of the party, so it will not threaten his position in the Whig party and the control of the entire party in the slightest.

Therefore, Henry Clay is happy to see Chen Mo's practice of subsidizing low-level young members of the party.

The young members who had been ostracized and discouraged by the Whigs and quit Congress were strongly supported by Chen, who funded them to return to their respective states, where they could continue to engage in political activities to resist the expansion of slavery or wait for the right moment.

Among them, one person temporarily withdrew from the Congress, returned to his old business, returned to his hometown with the funding of Chen Mo, opened a law firm, and became a lawyer again.

However, like most others who left, although he was temporarily dormant, he did not give up promoting his political ideas, and remained enthusiastic about public service, and his personal reputation continued to consolidate and improve.

The young political elites, who had left Congress and stayed away from the center of American power, had few contacts with the rest of the Whig Party, especially the party leader, Henry Clay, but they always maintained ties with Chen, who shared common beliefs and ideals, and who were funded, supported, and encouraged by Chen.

Under the influence of Chen Mo, they firmly believe that the abolition of slavery is imperative, there will eventually be a war between the north and the south, and the current temporary dormancy is only for the outbreak of the critical moment in the future, and their goal will eventually be achieved!

This group of al-Shabaabs, who were not valued by Henry Clay and even sat back and watched them be excluded in order to win the support of the southern slave owners, seemed to have formed a new small clique with Chen Mo, and the center of this clique was the great capitalist who provided them with economic and conviction support and showed them the way forward, Chen Mo!

Not only the young political elite who had left Congress, but also more and more members of the Whig Party, who had been ostracized by the growing power of slave owners in the South, joined this small circle and quietly hibernated with Chen Mo's support and reassurance.

All of them, including Chen Mo, who supported them behind them, were waiting for the time to come.

By 1852, in the fourteenth presidential election, the split between the pro-slave and anti-slave Whigs was fully apparent.

Former Vice President Millard Fillmore, who had previously taken over after Zachary Taylor's death, had aroused the resentment of many anti-slave holders in the Whig Party because of his consistent compromise on the North-South question, and the strength of these people was enough to deprive him of the party's nomination.

Eventually, in light of the victories in the previous two races, Henry Clay attempted to repeat the previous victory, again nominating a war hero, General Winfield Scott, as his presidential candidate.

However, there is an old saying in the mysterious ancient Chinese country, and this time, the Whig Party ushered in a complete and huge defeat, and only four states in the 31 states of the United States at that time won the votes, and the Whig Party was defeated by an absolute disadvantage, and everyone in the party lamented that the Whig Party was finished.

And during the election campaign, a major event occurred, the founder and leader of the Whig Party, Henry Clay, died, and the supporters who were still around him lost their backbone in an instant.

Without Henry Clay coordinating operations in the middle, all sorts of problems and contradictions were revealed.

The problems of the central bank, the problems of slavery, deepened the contradictions within the Whigs, and soon they became a mess of scattered sand, and the Whigs existed in name only.

At this time, the group of young political elites united around Chen Mo became a united and powerful force, but compared to the original Whig Party and the Democratic Party, they were still very weak.

However, while the Whigs were in decline, the small group centered on Chen Mo gradually grew stronger, and more and more Whigs who opposed slavery joined in, including even those former core Whigs who had some influence in Congress.

After all, politics is still a collective game, and without the backing of the powerful Whigs, they would not have had a good time in Congress, and the joint attacks and repression of slave supporters from inside and outside the party made them anxious to find a new group to fight the enemy together.

At this time, the Chen Mo Group, which had already been grouped together and united and helped each other, had an absolute advantage in the Whig Party, which had fallen apart and become a scattered group, and had always adhered to the same philosophy as them, became their best choice.