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The Deceleration of independence
On July 4th, 1776 the deceleration of independence was issued. The 13 American colonies severed their political connections to Great Britain. The Declaration summarized that the colonists wanted independence and freedom. -
Continental Congress adopts the Articles of Confederation
The Continental Congress adopted the Articles of Confederation, the first constitution of the United States, on November 15, 1777. However, ratification of the Articles of Confederation by all thirteen states did not occur until March 1, 1781. -
The Treaty of Amity was signed
On February 6, 1778, France and the United States of America signed the Treaty of Amity and Commerce and the Treaty of Alliance in Paris, France. The Treaty of Amity and Commerce recognized the United States as an independent nation and promoted trade between France and the United States. -
Siege of Yorktown
General George Washington and Comte de Rochambeau with nearly 18,000 American and French soldiers lay siege to Yorktown. A vital harbor in the lower Chesapeake Bay for British supply and troop movement. General Lord Cornwallis and 8,000 British troops try to defend the city in vain, and after nearly a month of fighting they surrender to Washington and Rochambeau. This was the last major land battle of the Revolutionary War. -
The Treaty of Paris was signed
The Treaty of Paris is signed, officially ending the Revolutionary war. Americans John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, and John Jay successively negotiate two key points of the treaty. 1- British recognition of American Independence. 2- The definition of boundaries. -
The US adopts the dollar
The US makes a bold move and accepts the Dollar, the first decimal coinage system in history. The US dollar today is the most used currency in the world. -
First Election
The 1788–89 United States presidential election was the first quadrennial presidential election. It was held from Monday, December 15, 1788 to Saturday, January 10, 1789, under the new Constitution ratified in 1788. -
New Government
The Confederation Congress, which operated under the Articles of Confederation (our first Constitution) picked March 4, 1789, as the day it handed off power to the new constitutional government. -
The Invention of the Cotton gin
Eli Whitney's invention of the cotton gin greatly increases the demand for slave labor. -
The US capital is changed
The U.S. capital is moved from Philadelphia to Washington, DC. -
Louisiana Purchase
The Louisiana Purchase was the acquisition of the territory of Louisiana by the United States from France in 1803. In return for fifteen million dollars, or approximately eighteen dollars per square mile, the United States nominally acquired a total of 828,000 sq mi. -
War of 1812
The War of 1812 was a conflict fought between the United States and the United Kingdom, with their respective allies, from June 1812 to February 1815. Historians in Britain often see it as a minor theatre of the Napoleonic Wars, while historians in the United States and Canada see it as a war in its own right. -
Burning of Washington
The Burning of Washington was a British invasion of Washington City, the capital of the United States, during the War of 1812. -
star spangled banner written
On September 14, 1814, Francis Scott Key pens a poem which is later set to music and in 1931 becomes America's national anthem, “The Star-Spangled Banner.” The poem, originally titled “The Defense of Fort McHenry,” was written after Key witnessed the Maryland fort being bombarded by the British during the War of 1812. -
Spain agrees to cede Florida to the United States.
The Adams–Onís Treaty (Spanish: Tratado de Adams-Onís) of 1819, also known as the Transcontinental Treaty, the Florida Purchase Treaty, or the Florida Treaty, was a treaty between the United States and Spain in 1819 that ceded Florida to the U.S. and defined the boundary between the U.S. and New Spain. -
Missouri Compromise
The Missouri Compromise was United States federal legislation that admitted Maine to the United States as a free state, simultaneously with Missouri as a slave state—thus maintaining the balance of power between North and South in the United States Senate. -
The Land Act of 1820
The United States federal law that ended the ability to purchase the United States' public domain lands on a credit or installment system over four years, as previously established. -
Monroe Doctrine
The Monroe Doctrine was a United States policy that opposed European colonialism in the Americas. It began in 1823; however, the term "Monroe Doctrine" itself was not coined until 1850. -
Indian Removal Act
The Indian Removal Act was signed into law on May 28, 1830, by United States President Andrew Jackson. The law authorized the president to negotiate with southern Native American tribes for their removal to federal territory west of the Mississippi River in exchange for white settlement of their ancestral lands. -
The Trail of Tears
The Trail of Tears was a series of forced relocations of approximately 60,000 Native Americans in the United States from their ancestral homelands in the Southeastern United States, to areas to the west of the Mississippi River that had been designated as Indian Territory. -
Nat Turner's slave rebellion
Nat Turner's Rebellion was a slave rebellion that took place in Southampton County, Virginia, in August 1831, led by Nat Turner. Rebel slaves killed from 55 to 65 people, at least 51 being white. The rebellion was put down within a few days, but Turner survived in hiding for more than two months afterwards. -
Slavery Abolition Act
The Slavery Abolition Act 1833 abolished slavery throughout the British Empire. This Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom expanded the jurisdiction of the Slave Trade Act 1807 and made the purchase. -
The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo
Treaty of Peace, Friendship, Limits and Settlement between the United States of America and the Mexican Republic,is the peace treaty signed on February 2, 1848, in the Villa de Guadalupe Hidalgo between the United States and Mexico that ended the Mexican–American War. The treaty was ratified by the United States on March 10 and by Mexico on May 19. The ratification were exchanged on May 30, and the treaty was proclaimed on July 4, 1848. -
Fugitive Slave Act of 1850
The Fugitive Slave Act or Fugitive Slave Law passed by the United States Congress on September 18, 1850, as part of the Compromise of 1850 between Southern slave-holding interests and Northern Free-Soilers. -
Civil War begins
The American Civil War was a civil war in the United States from 1861 to 1865, fought between the northern United States and the southern United States. The civil war began primarily as a result of the long-standing controversy over the enslavement of black people.