Civil War Prologue: 1607 - 1859

May 14, 1607.   104 men and boys in 3 ships from the Virginia Company land on Jamestown Island on the banks of the James River to establish the first permanent English colony in what will later become the U.S.A.

August, 1619.   English settlers in Jamestown, Virginia, buy 20 Africans from a Dutch ship's captain.   These Africans are treated as indentured servants, but succeeding Africans are treated as slaves. ^{Schles 37}

December 21, 1620.   102 Pilgrims from the Mayflower land at Plymouth Rock on the western shore of Cape Cod Bay in southeastern Massachusetts.   This is the second permanent English colony is what will later become the U.S.A.

May 18, 1652.   First record of slaves in Rhode Island.   The Netherlands agrees to permit the export of black slaves to the New Netherland colony (later, New York City).   The Dutch colonists pass legislation that regulates treatment of slaves by their masters.   Slaves may be punished by whipping only with the express approval of colonial government authority. ^{Schles 51}

1664.   Maryland mandates the lifelong servitude of black slaves.   Later, New York, New Jersey, North Carolina, South Carolina and Virginia pass similar laws. ^{Schles 56}

September 23, 1667.   Virginia passes a law that conversion of slaves to Christianity does not free them. ^{Schles 57}

1670.   TThe Virginia Slavery Act states that slaves who become Christians before their importation are not liable for lifelong slavery. ^{Schles 57}

1671.   Carolina defeats the Coosa Indians and enslaves some of the captives. ^{Schles 58}

Maryland extends its slavery law so that a christian baptism of slaves before or after importation does not free them. ^{Carruth 58}

1682.   Virginia repeals its 1670 law to allow slavery for those baptised to christianity before importation. ^{Carruth 64}

April, 1688.   Quakers in Germantown, PA, issue a formal protest to the importation of slaves into American. ^{Schles 66}

1696.   The monopoly of the Royal African Trade Company for slave trading ends.   New England shippers and traders take up this profitable enterprise to extend the slave trade. ^{Carruth 69}

The American Quakers forbid the importation of slaves.   Violators are to be expelled from membership. ^{Carruth 38}

June 24, 1700.   Boston judge, Samuel Sewall, publishes the first anti-slavery tract in the English colonies, The Selling of Joseph. ^{Schles 70}

1705.   The Virginia Black Code restricts slave travel and prescribes miscegenation penalties.^{Schles 73}   Also, all imported servants are to remain in lifelong servitude except for those who had been Christians in their native country or who had been free in a christian country.   This limited slavery to blacks and confined all imported blacks to slavery. ^{Carruth 42}

New York passes a law providing for the death penalty for slaves caught beyond a line 40 miles north of Albany. ^{Schles 73}

Massachusetts passes a law making marriages between black and whites illegal. ^{Schles 73}

1707.   Mechanics in Philadelphia object to the competition to their crafts by hired black slaves. ^{Schles 73}

June 12, 1712.   Pennsylvania bans the importation of slaves into the Pennsylvania colony. ^{Schles 75}

June 6, 1716.   The first black slaves arrive in French Louisiana from ships owned by the Company of the West. ^{Schles 77}

1719.   Philippe François Renault brings 500 slaves along with 200 white mechanics and miners from the West Indies into Illinois country, thus introducing the slave v. free question early into that state. ^{Gray 64}

1724.   Louisiana French governor, de Bienville, establishes a code that regulates slave activities. ^{Schles 79}

1725.   The slave population in the colonies is estimated to be 75,000. ^{Carruth 52}

February 22, 1732.   George Washington is born.   He will be the indefatigable, indominable military leader of the 13 American colonies during the American Revolutionary War.

September 9, 1739.   A slave revolt occurs in South Carolina, one of three.   Deaths are 44 blacks and 30 whites.   A second uprising occurs at Stone Creek led by a slave named Cato and a third in St. John's Parish in Berkeley County. ^{Carruth 58}   These are the first of about 250 slave insurrections that will occur before the Civil War

January, 1740.   Slaves revolt in Charleston, SC.   50 slaves are hanged. ^{Schles 86}

February 28, 1741.   A burglary and series of fires panic the population in New York City.   It is rumored that blacks and poor whites are trying to seize power.   101 blacks are convicted, 4 whites and 18 blacks are hanged, 13 blacks are burned alive, and 70 blacks are banished. ^{Schles 87}

1743.   New Jersey itinerant Quaker clergyman, John Woolman, begins a series of sermons on the evils of slavery and pleads for racial equality.   His antislavery ideas are published in Some Considerations on the Keeping of Negroes in 1754. ^{Schles 87}

October 26, 1749.   The trustees of the Georgia colony obtain the permission of the English Parliament to revoke the prohibition of slavery in the colony.   Prior to this, a parliamentary act of 1735 forbade the importation of slaves and rum, although Georgians and other colonists had often ignored the law because of their perceived need for field and house hands.   Also, English shippers and traders found the law restrictive of their profits in the slave trade.   The revocation of this act makes legal slavery in the colonies and begins the plantation system in the South. ^{Carruth 66}   It also encourages northern shippers and slave traders to extend their traffic in slaves.

March 16, 1751.   James Madison is born.   He will make a major contribution to the drafting of the Constitution and its ratification by the states by writing, with Alexander Hamilton and John Jay, the Federalist essays.

1754.   John Woolman writes his essay, Some Considerations on the Keeping of Negroes, to persuade Quaker slave owners to free their slaves.   He is a strong voice for freeing slaves over a period of several years. ^{Carruth 66}

January 11, 1755.   Alexander Hamilton is born.   He will serve in the Continental Army during the American Revolutionalry War and help draft the Constitution.   He will then defend it by writing many of the Federalist essays.

1760.   South Carolina bans the slave trade within the colony, but this policy is disallowed by the English Parliament. ^{Schles 96}

1761.   The English King disallows a slave import duty increase in the Virginia colony. ^{Schles 97}

June 22, 1772.   The British Somerset Case frees a slave (Somerset, Somersett) brought into Great Britain from colonial masters that results in the freeing in Britain of from 14,000 to 15,000 foreign-owned slaves.   The case does not emancipate slaves or free them to work for any employer once in Britain.   What it does do is remove the element of compulsion by providing slaves with the legal right not to be forcibly removed from the country.   The case worries colonial slaveowners because its principle could become law in the British colonies.

1773.   Yale University president, Ezra Stiles, and Congregational clergyman, Samuel Hopkins, promote colonizing West Africa with free American blacks. ^{Schles 113}

1774.   Connecticut and Rhode Island forbid the importation of slaves. ^{Schles 115}

April 14, 1775.   Benjamin Franklin and Dr. Benjamin Rush in Philadelphia organize the first abolition society, the Society for the Relief of Free Negroes Unlawfully Held in Bondage. ^{Schles 117}   The organization title serves as an appropriate definition of abolition.   People who espouse freeing black slaves are called abolitionists.

April 19, 1775.   The American Revolutionary War begins with the battles of Lexington and Concord, Massachusetts, between about 4,000 patriot ("rebel") minutemen and militia and about 1,800 British troops.

April 12, 1777.   Henry Clay is born.   He will make many attempts to preserve the Union from secession caused by slavery, including drafting legislation that would eventually be known as the Compromise of 1850.

March 1, 1780.   Pennsylvania, one of the 13 original British colonies settled in 1682 and entered the Union on Dec. 12, 1787, mandates the gradual abolition of slavery in the state.   No child born after this date will be a slave. ^{Carruth 96}

March 1, 1781.   The Articles of Confederation become effective with Maryland's ratification, the last of 13 states.   This is the second document after the Declaration of Independence that partially unifies the states and it is the first document of the "United States of America".

1782.   An emancipation law is enacted by Virginia under urgings by Thomas Jefferson.   The law provides that an owner is allowed to set free his slaves. ^{Carruth 98}

January 18, 1782.   Daniel Webster is born.   By 1828, the dominant economic interests of Massachusetts changed from shipping to manufacturing, so Webster backed the high-tariff bill of that year.   Angry Southern leaders condemned the tariff, and South Carolina's John C. Calhoun argued that his state had the right to nullify the law.   In 1833, Webster and Pres. Andrew Jackson joined forces to suppress South Carolina's attempt to nullify the tariff.

March 18, 1782.   John C. Calhoun is born.   He developed a theory of nullification that states can nullify federal legislation because the states had ratified the Constitution.   In 1832, this theory was put to the test when South Carolina passed an ordinance that claimed to nullify federal tariffs.   The "Nullification Crisis" almost degenerated into violence, but coercion by US Navy warships in Charleston averted a secession.   Calhoun led the pro-slavery faction in the senate in the 1830s and 1840s, opposing both abolitionism and the limitation of the expansion of slavery into the western territories.   He was a major advocate of the Fugitive Slave Law, which forced the cooperation of Free States in returning escaping slaves.

July 8, 1783.   The Massachusetts Supreme Court abolishes slavery in the state as prescribed by the Massachusetts constitution of 1780. ^{Carruth 100}   Massachusetts was first settled on December 21, 1620 will enter the Union on Feb. 6, 1788.

September 3, 1783.   Final peace treaties to end the American Revolutionary War are signed by Great Britain, France, Spain, The Netherlands, and the United States.   Spain will acquire East and West Florida, lost to Great Britain in the French and Indian War.   France gains no additional North American territory.   Most scholars use this date as the termination of the war.   On January 14, 1784, the Continental Congress approves the peace treaty, which formally ends the Revolutionary War for the U.S.A.

March 1, 1784.   Slavery is abolished gradually in Rhode Island and Connecticut, effective on this date.   In RI, male children of slaves are freed when they reach 21 years; females when they reach 18 years.   In CT, male and female slaves are freed at the age of 25.   This will be changed to 21 years, effective August 1, 1797.   Connecticut, first settled in 1634, will enter the Union as a free state on Jan. 9, 1788.     Rhode Island, first settled in 1636, it will enter the Union as a free state on May 29, 1790, the last of the 13 former British colonies.

July 13, 1787.   The Continental Congress adopts the Northwest Ordinance of 1787, which forbids slavery in the Northwest Territory.   To circumvent this prohibition, owners in some states like Illinois make them "indentured servants" who are not much better off than slaves. ^{Gray 94}

March 25, 1788.   Massachusetts adopts a law that declares the slave trade illegal and provides for monetary damages for any victims of kidnapping.   This law is the result of a petition from liberated blacks led by Prince Hall resulting from the seizure and transporting of blacks to the West Indian Island of Martinique. ^{Schles 151}

March 4, 1789.   The U.S. Constitution becomes effective.   It permits slavery (Section 1.9) until at least 1808, when the Congress can address this issue again.

September 24, 1789.   The Federal Congress creates the Judiciary Act, establishing the Supreme Court and subsidiary federal courts in accordance with the requirements of the U.S. Constitution.

January 5, 1791.   North Carolina rejects a formal protest by free blacks who want to initiate lawsuits and provide court testimony. ^{Schles 158}

December 15, 1791.   The first 10 amendments to the Constitution are adopted.   Known also as the Bill of Rights, it does not address the slavery issue.

1792.   Denmark becomes the first nation to abolish the slave trade. ^{Schles 162}

April, 1792.   At the Kentucky constitutional convention, Presbyterian clergyman, David Rice, unsuccessfully attempts to exclude slavery from the state. ^{Schles 161}

April 4, 1792.   Thaddeus Stevens is born.   He will be a passionate believer in the principles of Radical Republicanism and will push for emancipation and black suffrage.   Stevens will be a critic of President Andrew Johnson's Reconstruction policy and eventually will become a leader in the effort to impeach the president.   He will advocate treating the former CSA states during Reconstruction as "conquered provinces".   He will support the Fourteenth Amendment and an unsuccessful plan to confiscate plantations and redistribute the land to former slaves.

February 12, 1793.   Congress passes the Fugitive Slave Act, which gives the right of a slaveowner to recover a runaway slave in another state.   This law implements the provision in the Constitution, Section 4.2. ^{Schles 163}

October, 1793.   Eli Whitney applies for a patent on his invention, the cotton gin.   This hand-cranked machine separates the seeds from the cotton fibers and reduces the slave labor required to remove them by hand.   It increases the productivity of cotton, reduces its price, increases the demand for more cotton, making it more profitable, which extends its planting and cultivation and increases the need for more slaves.   Later, the cotton gin will be even more productive when operated by steam power.

November-December, 1798.   Kentucky and Virginia adopt resolutions declaring that the federal Alien and Sedition Acts passed into law in June and July are unconstitutional and that the states retain the right to determine complaince with this act. ^{Schles 164}   This is the first significant declaration of states' rights, which forever will be a contentious issue between the federal and state governments.   Since that time, however, federal powers have been augmented and state powers diminished continuously.

March 29, 1799.   New York State, first settled in 1614 and joining the Union on July 26, 1788, passes a law providing for gradual slave emancipation. ^{Schles 172}

January 2, 1800.   Philadelphia free blacks petition Congress to oppose slavery, the slave trade, and the Fugitive Slave Act of 1793, but the issue expires in committee. ^{Schles 173}

August, 1800.   Gabriel Prossner, a black slave coachman, plans a revolt to rescue thousands of slaves near Richmond, VA.   An informer causes Prossner and at least 37 others to be caught and hanged. ^{Schles 164}

April 30 1803.   The U.S.A purchases the Louisiana Territory from France.   It is an area of more than 2 million sq km (800,000 sq mi) extending from the Mississippi River to the Rocky Mountains.   The price is 60 million francs, about $15 million; $11,250,000 was to be paid directly, with the balance to be covered by the assumption by the United States of French debts to American citizens.   As the territory is divided into subterritories and states, it will engender divisiveness between southern and northern states because it contains land that can be worked by slaves and free laborers.

February 15, 1804.   Slavery is abolished in New Jersey (first settled in 1660 and joined the Union on Dec. 18, 1787) by gradual emancipation.   Children born to an enslaved woman after July 4, 1804 are free.   However, the law provides that female children are obligated to serve their mother's owner until the age of 21, and male children were obligated until the age of 25.   If an owner did not wish to enforce this obligation, he or she could abandon the infant to the local overseers of the poor when it was one year old and be relieved of its care.   People who were born into slavery before July 4, 1804 were slaves for life unless their owners chose to manumit them.

December 12, 1805.   William Lloyd Garrison is born.   He will be a strong voice for slavery abolition between 1831 and 1865 through his anti-slavery newspaper, the Liberator, and speaking engagements.   His newspaper will produce 1,830 issues with no omissions.   In 1832, Garrison helped organize the New England Anti-Slavery Society and the American Anti-Slavery Society in 1833.   These were the first organizations that promoted immediate emancipation.

March 25, 1807.   British Parliament abolishes the slave trade.

January 1, 1808.   In accord with Section 1.9 of the Constitution, President Jefferson asks Congress on Dec. 2, 1806 to ban slave importation to the U.S. effective January 1, 1808.   Congress passes this law on March 2, 1807.   Slave ships caught attempting to break this law forfeit the ship and cargo.   States making the seizures can dispose of the cargo. ^{Schles 185,187}   This law will be broken continuously by land and sea slave traders.

June 3, 1808.   Jefferson Davis is born.   He will be a West Point graduate and serve in the Black Hawk and Mexican wars.   He will leave the Army and become a cotton planter.   He will serve in the House and Senate, but resign from the latter office to run unsuccessfully for governor of Mississippi.   He will the Secretary of War under President Pierce, after which he will return to the Senate.   After Mississippi will secede from the Union, it will elect him commander of its state armed forces, but a few weeks later he will be called by election to the Presidency of the Confederate States of America, a position he will hold throughout the war.

February 12, 1809.   Abraham Lincoln is born.   Born in poverty, but highly ambitious, Lincoln will make extraordinary efforts to acquire knowledge while working on a farm, splitting rails for fences, and keeping store,   He will become a lawyer, spent eight years in the Illinois legislature, and ride the court circuit.   In 1858 Lincoln will run unsuccessfully against Stephen A. Douglas, a Democrat, for Senator.   However, in the 7 debates with Douglas he will gain a national reputation that will win him the Republican nomination for President in 1860.   As president, Lincoln will lead the Union to victory in the American Civil War, only to be assasinated shortly thereafter.

April 23, 1813.   Stephen A. Douglas is born.   He will migrate from Vermont to Jacksonville, Illinois, where he will be admitted to the Bar in 1834, and will later acquire a successful law practice.   In 1836 he will become a member of the state legislature.   In 1837 he will be appointed by President Van Buren as registrar of the land office at Springfield, IL.   He will become a judge of the supreme court of Illinois from 1841 to 1843.   In 1843 he will be elected to the U. S. House of Representatives and will be elected to the U. S. Senate in 1847, where he will serve until his death on June 3, 1861.   In 1854, he will introduce what will become the Kansas-Nebraska Act, which will reopen the slavery dispute.   In 1852, 1856 and 1860 he will run unsuccessfully for the Presidency.

August 10, 1814.   William Lowndes Yancey is born.   He will be an outstanding lawyer who served in the Alabama state house of representatives, the state senate, and the U. S. Congress.   In 1848, Yancey will write the Alabama Platform, which will demand that Congress provide protection of slavery in the territories.   Yancey's doctrine will be adopted by several Southern states.   He also will advocate the reopening of the African slave trade.     At the national convention of the Democratic party in Charleston in 1860, he will express the Southern demands for a Federal slave code in the territories as a plank in the Democratic platform, but it will be refused, so Yancey and most of the southern delegates will walk out of the convention, form their own Constitutional Democratic Party, thereby splitting the Democratic party and assuring Abraham Lincoln's election to the presidency.   Yancey will then write the Alabama ordinance of secession.   CSA president, Jefferson Davis, will send Yancey to Europe as a Confederate commissioner to secure recognition from England and France, but in this task he will be unsuccessful.   In 1862, he will be elected to the Confederate senate, where he will serve until ill health and death in 1863.

December 28, 1816.   Presbyterian clergyman Robert Finley founds the American Colonization Society in Washington, DC.   Its goal is to resettle free blacks in Africa.   Most of its members are not abolitionists, but only want to reduce the numbers of slaves, thereby protecting slavery.   Therefore, not all abolitionists favor the aims of this society, which they see as avoiding the slavery issue.

December 3, 1818.   Illinois, first settled in 1702, enters the Union with a deliberately confused Constitution to maintain a form of slavery as "indentured servants".   Although officially against slavery, since Congress would accept no other status of blacks, its code of laws provides for extremely harsh treatment of wayward blacks in anticipation that its later laws will legalize slavery. ^{Gray 94}

March 3, 1819.   In response to widespread slave smuggling, Congress passes a law that gives a $50 reward to informers who report the illegal importation of slaves into the U.S. ^{Schles 208}

February 6, 1820.   86 blacks emmigrate from New York City to Sierra Leone, the first organized immigration of freed blacks in the U.S. ^{Carruth 162}

March 3, 1820.   Congress passes a law known as the Missouri Compromise of 1820 that admits Maine as a free state and Missouri as a slave state to maintain the balance between southern and northern legislators at 12 each.   This law also excludes slavery in the Louisiana Purchase north of 36°30' latitude. ^{Schles 209}

May 15, 1820.   Congress passes a law making the trade in foreign slaves an act of piracy, which increases the previous forfeiture penalty to the death penalty for convicted Americans. ^{Schles 209}

1822.   The republic of Liberia is founded in West Africa by the American Colonization Society as a haven for freed blacks who will begin arriving that year.   In Mt. Pleasant, Ohio, Quaker Benjamin Lundy published one of the first abolitionist journals, The Genius of Universal Emancipation. ^{Schles 210}

May 30, 1822.   In Charleston, SC, a black informer reveals a plot led by freed black, Denmark Vesey, for a slave uprising.   130 blacks and 4 whites are tried, 35 blacks, including Vesey, are hanged, while the 4 whites are jailed and fined.   As a result of this trial, southern states enact stricter slave control. ^{Schles 211}

May, 1824.   Congress passes a Protective Tariff Act that further exacerbates the conflicts of interests between northern manufacturers who want protective tariffs and southern planters who want no tariffs because they increase prices of manufactured imports. ^{Bowman 14}

March 9, 1828.   Tariffs are a source of conflict between southern and northern states.   Tariffs are a tax on imports, usually of manufactured goods.   Since most manufacturing was done in the northern states and its products and competiting foreign taxed manufactures were used extensively in the South, e.g., clothing from English mills, the tariffs caused higher prices for manufactured goods and adversely affected the profits of southerners more than northerners.   President John Quincy Adams signed the law after much acrimoneous debate in the Congress.   This Tariff of 1828 became known in the South as the "Tariff of Abominations". ^{Carruth 178}

December 19, 1828.   South Carolina, Georgia, Mississippi, and Virginia adopt resolutions declaring the Tariff of Abominations oppressive, unjust, and unconstitutional.   South Carolina Senator, John C. Calhoun, writes the South Carolina Exposition and Protest, which rejects nationalism, argues that such federal laws may be nullified by the states. ^{Carruth 178}

January 1, 1831.   William Lloyd Garrison first publishes his abolitionist newspaper, The Liberator.   He is a radical, but espouses abolition by peaceful persuasion. ^{Bowman 15}

August 21, 1831.   Nat Turner, a pious and radical slave preacher, leads an uprising of slaves in Southhampton County, VA.   About 70 whites are killed before the rebellion is put down.   Turner and 12 of his followers are executed and about 100 blacks are killed in search of Turner. ^{Schles 224}

1832.   The abolitionist New England Anti-Slavery Society is founded. ^{Schles 227}

July, 1832.   Congress adopts the Tariff Act of 1832 that is milder than that of 1828, but still oppressive in the view of southern slave states. ^{Bowman 15}

24 November, 1832.   A South Carolina state convention adopts a law that nullifies the Tariff Acts of 1828 and 1832.   On November 27, the state adopts measures to enforce this ordinance, even allowing for military preparations and secession if the Federal Government resorts to force. ^{Schles 226}

December 10, 1832.   President Jackson reinforces the forts off Charleston, SC and then issues a proclamation that no state can secede from the Union because each secession destroys the unity of the nation. ^{Schles 226}

March 2, 1833.   President Jackson signed two bills.   The first is Senator Henry Clay's compromise Tariff of 1833, which eases some of the southern concerns over the Tariff of 1828 (Tariff of Abominations).   The second bill, called the Force Act, authorized the President to enforce collections of tariffs using the Army and Navy, if necessary.   The nullification of federal laws by states is averted as an issue. ^{Carruth 190}

March 15, 1833.   The South Carolina Ordinance of Nullification is revoked at a state convention.   However, on March 18, the convention passed an ordinance that nullifies the Force Act. ^{Carruth 190}

August 28, 1833.   Great Britain abolishes slavery in her colonies. ^{Schles 228}

December, 1833.   Arthur and Lewis Tappan, wealthy merchants of New York City, and prominent abolitionist minister Theodore Weld organize the American Anti-Slavery Society   Weld speaks and writes frequently on abolition for years to come. ^{Bowman 15}

1835.   Unitarian leader, William Ellery Channing, advocates the abolition of slavery by publishing Slavery, an anti-slavery pamphlet, which will be followed by 2 others. ^{Schles 232}

October, 1835.   A mob parades William Lloyd Garrison, publisher of the abolitionist newspaper, The Liberator, through the Boston streets with a rope around his neck because of his radical anti-slavery views. ^{Bowman 16}

January, 1836.   In Philadelphia, James Birney publishes the first issue of the Philantropist, an anti-slavery newspaper. ^{Schles 232}

January 11, 1836.   Abolititionists present petitions to Congress to abolish slavery in the District of Columbia.   Senator John C. Calhoun refuses to accept the petitions and calls them "foul slander" of the South. ^{Schles 232}

March 11, 1836.   The U.S. Senate begins what will become a routine reaction to abolitionist petitions.   They hear the petititions and then reject them. ^{Schles 232}

March 17, 1836.   Texas, still under Mexican rule, but having declared its independence on March 2, adopts a constitution that legalizes slavery. ^{Schles 232}

May 26, 1836.   The House of Representatives vote a "gag" rule that all petitions or papers involving slavery are "laid on the table"; that is, they are killed without discussion (a parliamentary procedure).   The House continues to vote the "gag rule" at the beginning of every session until 1844.   The effect of this rule is to sharpen the slavery issue between southern and northern congressmen. ^{Schles 233}

March 9, 1841.   In the Amistad case, the Supreme Court rules that the 53 black mutineers on a Spanish slave ship named Amistad taken into U.S. custody in August, 1839, be allowed to return to Africa. ^{Schles 241}

1842.   An accused fugitive slave, George Latimer, is arrested by Boston authorities, but abolititionists force them to buy his freedom from his Virginia owner. ^{Schles 245}

January 24, 1842.   Citizens of Haverhill, MA, have John Quincy Adams submit a petition to Congress that requests the peaceful dissolution of the Union. ^{Schles 243}

March 1, 1842.   The U.S. Supreme Court rules in Prigg v. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, that the Pennsylvania law forbidding the seizure of fugitive slaves in that state is unconstitutional.   The opinion further states that the enforcement of fugitive slave laws is a federal responsibility, so some Northern states use this loopholle to adopt personal liberty laws. ^{Schles 244}

March 21-23, 1842 .   Representative Joshua Giddings, an Ohio Whig abolitionist, presents several resolutions to the House following the controversy over the Creole mutiny and subsequent British freeing of the slaves from this American vessel.   Secretary of State, Daniel Webster, and others demand that the British return the slaves because they were the property of American citizens.   Giddings disagrees and is censured by the House.   On March 23, Giddings resigns his seat, but in April, voters in his home district reelect him for return on May 8. ^{Schles 244}

August 30, 1842.   Congress passes a new Tariff Act that restores the high tariffs of 1832.   This exacerbates dissensions between southerners and northerners. ^{Carruth 216}

1843.   The Vermont state assembly blocks the execution of the Fugitive Slave Act of 1793. ^{Schles 248}

1844.   The Baptist Church splits into the northern and southern conventions over slavery. ^{Schles 248}

December 3, 1844.   The "gag rule" banning petitions about slavery from the House of Representatives is lifted. ^{Carruth 220}

1845.   The Methodist Episcopal Church splits into the northern and southern conferences over slavery. ^{Schles 250}

March 3, 1845.   Florida, a territory settled in 1565 by Spaniards, becomes a slave state. ^{Schles 248}   Iowa will later be admitted as a slave-free state to keep the balance between southern and northern interests.

May, 1845.   Frederick Douglass, a runaway slave, publishes an autobiography, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave, which becomes a best seller.   Douglass escaped from his Maryland owner in 1838.   He made his way to New Bedford, MA, where he became involved with the abolitionist movement in which he became a prominent speaker in America and England, associating himself with William Lloyd Garrison and his abolitionist newspaper, The Liberator.   Douglass, who believed in violent abolition, and Garrison, who believed in pacific abolition, eventually dissolved their relationship.

May 13, 1845.   Congress declares war against Mexico, which will become another devisive issue between southern and northern states because it will lead to more territory to be worked by slaves. ^{Schles 251}

December 29, 1845.   Texas, settled in 1682, is admitted to the Union as a slave state. ^{Schles 249}

August 8, 1846.   The appropriations bill to purchase Mexican territory has attached an amendment named after Pennsylvania representative, David Wilmot, that disallows slavery in any territory acquired from Mexico.   The House passes the bill, but the Senate adjourns without doing so.   On February 19, 1847, the Senate and House approve the bill without the Wilmot Proviso amendment.   During the debate over this bill, John C. Calhoun introduces four resolutions justifying slavery in existing and prospective states and Congress has the duty to protect slavery.   These arguments are contrary to the Missouri Compromise of 1820. ^{Schles 252,253}

December 28, 1846.   Iowa, settled in 1788, is admitted to the Union as a slave-free state.   An approximate balance is maintained between slave and nonslave states.

December 29, 1847.   In a letter to A.P. Nicholson, a Tennessee politician, Senator Lewis Cass of Michigan sets forth the doctrine of "popular sovereignty"; that is, that slavery should be left to the decision of the territorial government.   Its attraction is that it sidesteps constitutional and moral issues. ^{Schles 254}

February 2, 1848.   The Mexican War ends with the signing of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo.   The Senate approves this treaty in March.   This new territory will engender further disputes over slavery. ^{Schles 255}   (Many subsequent Civil War officers and men will have been veterans of this war.)

May 29, 1848.   Wisconsin, settled in 1766, is admitted to the Union as a slavery-free state. ^{Schles 255}

August 14, 1848.   President Polk signs the bill creating the slave-free Oregon Territory. ^{Schles 255}

1849.   Harriet Tubman, the famous "conductor" for the "underground railroad", escapes from her Maryland owner and moves to Philadelphia and then to Canada.   Over a period of 10 years she returns 19 times to Maryland to rescue about 300 slaves and leads them through a series of safe houses that culminate in their safe residences in Canada or northern states.   Southern slave owners posted rewards as high as $40,000 for her capture, which never occurs.   During the Civil War she will contribute as a nurse and cook to Union forces.   After the war, she will reside in Auburn, NY, where she dies in 1913.   There is no known date of original of the "underground railroad", but by the 1840s it exists in all the border states.

March 3, 1849.   Minnesota Territory is established by Congress.   Slavery is prohibited. ^{Carruth 232}

March 10, 1849.   Missouri states that "the right to prohibit slavery in any territory belongs exclusively to the people thereof." ^{Schles 2}

September 1-October 13, 1849.   A California constitutional convention at Monterey drafts a constitution that prohibits slavery.   It is ratified by popular vote on November 12. ^{Schles 257}   (California was first settled in 1769.)

September 9-12, 1850.   Congress adopts 5 bills, together known as the Compromise of 1850.   (1) California is to be admitted as a slave-free state, (2) New Mexico and Utah territories are to be admitted with no slave restrictions, (3) Texas is admitted to the Union with no slave restrictions, (4) the slave trade is abolished in the District of Columbia, (5) a new, strengthened Fugitive Slave Act.   (The original Fugitive Slave Law of February 12, 1793 was mostly circumvented in the North.)   President Fillmore signs all the acts. ^{Schles 258}

February 15, 1850.   A mob of blacks in Boston rescues Shadrach, an accused fugitive, from a jail.   On February 18, President Fillmore warns that the Fugitive Slave Act must be enforced.   Other rescues this year include Rachel Parker in Baltimore, Thomas Simms in Boston, Jerry in Syracuse, and Christiana in Pennsylvania.   The northern states' circumventing of this law causes much dissension among southerners and would later be cited in the South Carolina secession proclamation. ^{Schles 260}

June 5, 1851.   Uncle Tom's Cabin, a novel by Harriet Beecher Stowe, appears as a serial in the National Era, an anti-slavery paper published in Washington, DC.   In March, 1852, this novel will be published as a two-volume book and within one year over 1 million copies will be sold.   Its depiction of slave life further exacerbates the southern and northern division over slavery. ^{Schles 260,261}

May 26, 1854.   In an effort to reduce the tensions over slavery, Senator Stephen A. Douglas of Illinois sponsors a bill known as the Kansas-Nebraska Act, a supposed new compromise that divides the Central Territory into two territories, Kansas and Nebraska, with provisions that the populations of each will determine the slave status, a concept known as "popular sovereignty".   The bill would in effect repeal the Missouri Compromise of 1820, since both states lie above the 36°30' latitude.   After much debate, the bill passes both houses and is signed by President Pierce. ^{Schles 264,265}   This law exacerbates the slavery issue between northern and southern states.

July 6, 1854.   The Republican party, which met informally on February 28 at Ripon, WI, meets formally at Jackson, MI, where it adopts a platform and candidates for Michigan offices.   Its members are drawn from people, mostly free-soiler and abolitionists, who are dissatisfied by the Kansas-Nebraska Act and the prevailing platforms of the Whig and Democrat parties.

July 19, 1854.   The Wisconsin Supreme Court declares the Fugitive Slave Act unconstitutional and frees a Mr. Booth, who was convicted of rescuing an accused runaway slave.   It is another case of states' rights (and laws) over federal laws. ^{Schles 266}

October 4, 1854.   Abraham Lincoln condemns the Kansas-Nebraska Act in a speech in Springfield, IL, but acknowledges the rights of southerners and supports gradual emancipation.   He will give the same speech in Peoria, IL, and his reputation will begin to spread throughout the country. ^{Schles 266}

March 30, 1855.   With the help of several thousand pro-slavery, armed Missouri "border ruffians", who cross the Kansas border to vote, a pro-slavery Kansas legislature is elected.   The election is upheld by governor Andrew H. Reeder, who fears further violence. ^{Schles 266}

July 2, 1855.   Frederick Douglass, a former slave who escaped his master, publishes his second autobiography, My Bondage, My Freedom wherein he describes this "peculiar institution" of which he is a graduate. ^{Schles 267}

July 2, 1855.   The pro-slavery Kansas legislature meets at Pawnee to adopt a strict series of pro-slavery laws, including severe penalties for anti-slavery agitation and oaths for officeholders, and expels anti-slavery legislators. ^{Schles 266}

July 31, 1855.   President Pierce removes Kansas governor Andrew H. Reeder for speculating in Kansas land that he is supposed to protect, but also because he opposes the pro-slavery legislature.   Pierce will later install Wilson Shannon of Ohio, a strong pro-slavery advocate. ^{Schles 266}

August 4, 1855.   Free slave-state supporters meet at Lawrence in the Kansas territory and call for a constitutional convention, outside the auspices of the pro-slavery legislature. ^{Schles 267}

September 5, 1855.   The anti-slavery Kansas colonists hold a convention at Big Springs and ask for admission to the Union as a free state.   They declare the territorial legislature illegal. ^{Schles 267}

October 1 - 9, 1855.   The pro-slavery Kansas "border ruffians" elect J.W. Whitfield as their congressional representative on October 1, but the anti-slavery supporters elect former governor Andrew Reeder to the same position. ^{Schles 267}

October 23 - November 12, 1855.   Free-soilers of Kansas hold a convention at Topeka and adopt a constitution that outlaws slavery and later adopt a law that bars blacks from the territory.   A civil war now exists between the pro-slavery and anti-slavery population. ^{Schles 267}

January 15 - 24, 1856.   Kansas Free Soilers elect their own governor, Charles Robinson, and their own legislature.   President Pierce condemns these actions as an act of rebellion, since the federal government approved the pro-slavery legislature. ^{Schles 268}

March 4, 1856.   The anti-slavery government of Topeka, Kansas, petitions Congress for admission to the Union.   Republicans in Congress support them, but Stephen Douglas sponsors a bill that would admit Kansas as a state only after a new constitutional convention. ^{Schles 269}

May 21, 1856.   Pro-slavery men in Kansas kill one anti-slavery man in Lawrence.   In retaliation, a band of anti-slavery men led by abolitionist, John Brown, kills 5 pro-slavery men at Pottawotamie Creek.     About 200 people will be killed and $2,000,000 lost in property damages between November, 1855 and December, 1856.   This bloodshed gives the territory the name, "Bleeding Kansas". ^{Schles 269}

Nov. 4, 1856.   Democratic candidate, James Buchanan of Pennsylvania, defeats Republican cadidate John Frémont and Whig and American (Know-Nothing) candidate, Millard Fillmore. ^{Schles 270}

March 6, 1857.   The Supreme Court decides in Dred Scott v. Sandford that the Missouri Compromise of 1820 is unconstitutional and any prohibition of slavery anywhere in the states or territories is unconstitutional, which also eliminates state "popular sovereignty" anti-slavery laws.   Scott was a slave whose owner who took him from the slave state, Missouri, to the free state, Illinois, and territory north of the latitude 36°30' and then back to Missouri.   Scott sues for his freedom, arguing that he lived in a state where slavery was forbidden by the Missouri Compromise of 1820.   The Court in a 5-4 decision ruled that Scott had never ceased to be a slave and so could not be considered a citizen with a right to sue in Federal Court.   It further stated that Congress cannot deprive citizens of their property, which includes slaves, anywhere in the U.S.   (The Court minority argues that Scott became a free black, who are citizens.)   The decision further aggravates abolitionists, who sponsored the case, and free-soilers. ^{Schles 271}

October 5, 1857.   Kansas territorial elections result in a majority for the Free State Party. ^{Schles 272}

December 21, 1857.   A pro-slavery constitution is approved at Lecompton, Kansas. ^{Schles 272}

May 8, 1858.   At a secret convention at Chatham, Ontario, Canada, John Brown presents his constitution for a Provisional Government of the United States to deal with the slave issue.   He is elected commander in chief of the Provisional Army, which includes members scattered across several states and Canada.   He plans to seize the federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry to arm slaves and abolitionists in that area in a massive insurrection to support his new government. ^{Hearn 8}   Thinking he is preordained by God to abolish slavery, Brown intends to set up a "country" for slaves in the Appalachian Mts, or at least shock people into a war that would end slavery. ^{Schles 275}

May 11, 1858.   Minnesota, first settled in 1805, is admitted to the Union as a slave-free state.

June 16, 1858.   The Republican Party nominates Abraham Lincoln to run as senator against Democrat Stephen Douglas. ^{Schles 273}

August 2, 1858.   The Lecompton Constitution is submitted to Kansas voters for a third time and is rejected.   By so voting, they also reject statehood.   Kansas will not be admitted to the Union until 1861. ^{Schles 273}

August 21 - October 15, 1858.   Abraham Lincoln and Stephen Douglas meet in seven debates across Illinois.   Douglas will be elected senator by the Illinois legislature where Democrats hold a majority, but Lincoln will emerge as a national spokesman for the anti-slavery position. ^{Schles 273}

February 14, 1859.   Oregon is admitted to the Union as a slave-free state.

March, 1859.   The Supreme Court reverses the Wisconsin Supreme Court in Ableman v. Booth and rules that state courts may not free federal prisoners.   This case confirms the constitutionality of the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850.   The federal government rearrests and imprisons Booth. ^{Bowman 39}

October 16 - 18, 1859.   At Harpers Ferry, VA (later, WV), abolitionist John Brown leads a band of followers (13 white & 5 black) that attempts and fails to seize the federal arsenal to arm slaves and abolitionists in an insurrection that would establish a new government under his leadership.   He and some of his followers are captured while others are killed in a shootout with civilians and federal troops. ^{Hearn 13-32}

October 26 - November 2, 1859.   John Brown is tried at Charles Town, Jefferson County, VA (later, WV) by the Commonwealth of Virginia, found guilty, and sentenced to hang on December 2. ^{Hearn 35-39}

December 2, 1859.   John Brown is hanged at Charles Town, Jefferson County, VA (later, WV).   To many southerners, he is a symbol of the violence and anarchy that will prevail if blacks are not controlled.   To many northerners, he is a martyr for the abolitionist cause. ^{Hearn 40-42} (His captured followers are hanged at later dates.)

December 14, 1859.   Georgia passes a law disallowing a will or deed that grants freedom to slaves after the owner's death. ^{Schles 275}