-
He wasn't the first to advocate but definitely one of the earliest influential people to speak on slavery.
-
Congress passes the first Fugitive Slave Act, which makes it a crime to harbor an escaped slave.
-
Douglass advocates enlisting in the Union Army to lay the groundwork for citizenship during the Civil War.
-
The most famous conductor of the Underground Railroad.
-
In 1846 a slave named Dred Scott and his wife, Harriet, sued for their freedom in a St. Louis city court.
-
President Abraham Lincoln issued the Preliminary Emanicipation Proclamation in the midst of the Civil War, announcing on September 22, 1862.
-
Passed by Congress on January 31, 1865, and ratified on December 6, 1865, the 13th amendment abolished slavery in the United States.
-
The Civil Rights Act of 1866 granted citizenship and the same rights enjoyed by white citizens to all male persons in the United States "without distinction of race or color, or previous condition of slavery or involuntary servitude."
-
Tennessee passes the first of the "Jim Crow" segregation laws, segregating state railroads. Other Southern states pass similar laws over the next 15 years.
-
The ruling in this Supreme Court case upheld a Louisiana state law that allowed for "equal but separate accommodations for the white and colored races."
-
Its mission is "to ensure the political, educational, social, and economic equality of rights of all persons and to eliminate racial hatred and racial discrimination".
-
In this milestone decision, the Supreme Court ruled that separating children in public schools on the basis of race was unconstitutional.
-
-
Reports vary, but between 17 and 50 people were injured and hospitalized with one woman, Amelia Boynton, nearly beaten to death.
-
First African American U.S. President.
