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Congress Passes the Missouri Compromise
In the heat of firey tensions between abolisionists and slave owners rise, Congress passes the Missouri Compromise whose goal was to temporarily appease the clashing sides. The bill was designed to keep the balance of power of influence about America's future with slavery held by the North and the South. Missouri Compromise successfully kept the Union a whole over this rocky time of oppostion. -
Underground Railroad Becomes Formally Organized
The Underground Railroad, a network of escape routes managed by abolisionists, was neither a physical tunnel or railroad, but a way to make a stand against slavery. Heros, like Harriet Tudman, led over 100,000 blacks to freedom by running over a span 29 states into lands like Canada, Mexico, and the Caribbean where slavery was illegal. The freedom of Southern property sparked the establishment of laws in the future that demanded slaves be returned to their masters. -
The Mexican-American War Concludes
The Mexican-American War sparked with Mexico's lingering resentment over the separation from Texas and the Americans' desire for Manifest Destiny in aquiring Mexico's western territories. Relations soured when Texas became the U.S's 28th state. After the last shot was fired, President James Polk had successfully conquored one-third of Mexico's territory with theTreaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. -
The Compromise Of 1850 and the Fugitive Slave Act
The Compromise of 1850, a collective set of bills offered by Henry Clay, the man responsible for the Missory Compromise, once again temporarily kept the nation united. Amongst the bills was the Fugitive Slave Act which required citizens to assist in the recovery of runaway slaves. The act caused many who had previously been on the fence about slavery now took a definitive stance. -
Uncle Tom's Cabin
Uncle Tom's Cabin, Harriet Beecher Stowe's best-selling novel of the 19th century, couragously shined light upon slavery sterotypes and supported the anti-slavery of US abolisionists. The novel laid the framework for the Civil War and stirred controversial emotions amongst slave owners. -
Bleeding Kansas and the Nebraska-Kansas Act
Bleeding Kansas, violent political confrontations between abolishionists and slave owners, sparked the creation of the Kansas-Nebrask Act, an 1854 bill that mandated popular sovereignty within a new state's borders. On January 29, 1861, Kansas was admitted to the Union as a free state. The Civil War started less than 3 months later. -
Dred Scott Decision
The US Supreme Court decided affirmed slave owners' to travel with their slaves into the Western territories that issued slavery illegal, thereby negating popular sovereignty and neglected freedom for blacks in America. Many free men were taken back into slavery. -
John Brown's Raid on Harper's Ferry
Abolitionist John Brown led a small group on a raid in attemp to spark a slavery revolt in Harpers Ferry, Virginia on October 16, 1859. The rebels overran the arsenal, took hostages and spread the word of the raid. Brown and his bandwagon was overrun a few days later and were executed. -
Abraham Lincoln, America's first Republican President
In response to the Kansas Nebraska Act, the Republican Party, an abolisionist supported political group, emerged in 1854 to combat with the extension of slavery into western territories. With its election of Abraham Lincoln in 1860, the Republican Party took over the Union which frightened Southerns due to the idea that slavery would be abolished in the near future. The South argued that the constitution handed them the right to property and the success of Lincoln now threatened that. -
Confederate States of America
The Confederate States of America was a government set up on February 8, 1861, by South Carolina, Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Texas, Virginia, Arkansas, Tennessee, and North Carolina who secessed from the Union due to the fear of slavery dying.