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Invention of the Cotton Gin
Invention of the Cotton Gin Eli Whitney learned about the difficulty of picking and harvesting cotton while staying with Catherine Greene on her plantation. Her and her Plantation manager explained these difficulties to Eli and then he started work on the cotton gin. He was working on an embroidery when someone realized he could make something much better which also led him to make the cotton gin. -
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Underground Railroad
A network of secret routes and safe houses used by enslaved Africans in the United States who were trying to escape to the North or Canada. -
The Missouri Compromise
This was an effort by Congress to diffuse the sectional and political rivalries triggered by the request of Missouri late in 1819 for admission as a state in which slavery would be permitted. -
The Liberator is published
The liberator was an Abolitionist news paper article founded by William Lloyd Garrison and Isaac Knapp. These were made as anti slavery articles and many people were offended. -
Nat Turners Rebellion
The RebellionNat Turners Rebellion was the biggest rebellion among slaves ever recorded in history. The slaves killed anywhere from 55 to 65 people. This rebellion was ended in a couple of days but Nat Turner survived by hiding for more than two months. This caused there to be widespread fear. Militias took precautions by watching the slaves. -
Wilmont Proviso
Wilmot Proviso The Wilmot Proviso was made to eliminate slavery in the land gained from the Mexican War. Pennsylvania Congressman David Wilmot proposed his amendment to the bill and it was not accepted. It did however eventually help bring about the formation of the Republican party in 1854. -
The Kansas-Nebraska Act
Kansas-Nebraska ActThis act was passed by the U.S. Congress. It allowed people in the territory of Kansas and Nebraska to decide for themselves whether or not to allow slavery in their borders. It served to repeal the Missouri Compromise in 1820. -
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Bleeding Kansas
Bleeding Kansas is the term used to described the period of violence during the settling of the Kansas territory. The Kansas-Nebraksa Act ignored the Missouri Compromise’s use of latitude as the boundary between slave and free territory and instead used the principle of popular sovereignty to let the people decide whether the area became a free state or a slave state. It led to violence because both anti-slavery people and pro-slavery people went to kansas and fought for control. -
The Dred Scott Decision
Dred Scott DecisionThe United States Supreme Court issued a decision in the Dred Scott case that allowed slave owners to take their slaves into the western territories. This brought up the question of slavery being allowed in the west. They allowed the residents of the newly founded territories to vote if they would or would not allow slavery into their lands. -
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Lincoln-Douglas Debates
The Lincoln-Douglas debates were a series of formal political debates between the Abraham Lincoln and Stephen A. Douglas for one of Illinois' two United States Senate seats. Even though Lincoln lost to Douglas, Lincoln eventually became president of the United States because of these debates. -
Election of 1860
This election was between the Republican Abraham Lincoln and Southern Democrat John C. Beckinridge. This election was most likely a battle for pro-slavery and anti-slavery. In the months before Lincolns inauguration many southern states seceded. This set the stage for the American Civil War. -
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Secession of Southern States
The Confederate States, officially the Confederate States of America commonly referred to as the Confederacy, was a confederation of secessionist American states existing from 1861 to 1865. It was originally formed by seven slave states – South Carolina, Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, and Texas in the Lower South region of the United States whose regional economy was mostly dependent upon agriculture, which required slaves that the newly elected president Lincoln did not like -
Compromise of 1850
Part of the Compromise of 1850 was that the Fugitive Slave Act was amended and the slave trade in Washington, D.C. was abolished. Also, California was added to the Union as a free state and a territorial government was created in Utah.
