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In the mid-1800s, the economies of many northern states had moved away from farming to industry. A lot of people in the North worked and lived in large cities like New York, Philadelphia, and Boston. The southern states, however, had maintained a large farming economy and this economy was based on slave labor. While the North no longer needed slaves, the South relied heavily upon slaves for their way of life.
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Slavery was the central source of escalating political tension
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The first fighting over the slavery issue took place in Kansas. In 1854, the government passed the Kansas-Nebraska Act allowing the residents of Kansas to vote on whether they would be a slave state or a free state. The region was flooded with supporters from both sides. They fought over the issue for years. Several people were killed in small skirmishes giving the confrontation the name Bleeding Kansas. Eventually Kansas entered the Union as a free state in 1861.
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December 24: South Carolina approved the declaration of immediate causes that induce and justify the secession of the federal union.
December 10: For the first time in history, women were granted the vote
March 14: Abraham Lincoln becomes the president of the United States and declares the Civil War. -
January 3: American Civil War
February 8: Florida, Mississippi, Alabama, Louisiana, Texas, Georgia and South Carolina form the "Confederate States of America"
April 10: The Civil War begins, between the northern and southern states.
July 25: The United States Congress passed the Crittenden-Johnson resolution, which says that the war was being fought to maintain the Union and not to end slavery. -
September 5: The Confederacy carried out its first invasion to the north.
September 22 Abraham Lincoln, signs the law that establishes the abolition of slavery in his country from 1863. -
March 1: The state of Nebraska becomes part of the North American Union.
March 30: Russia and the United States sign the treaty by which the former cedes Alaska for 7.2 million dollars. -
August 1: Colorado is admitted as the 38th state of the United States of America.
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April 14: President Abraham Lincoln, suffers an attack and dies the next day.
May 9: The Civil War ended.
June 23: Stand Wattie signed a ceasefire treaty with Union representatives, becoming the last Confederate general to be defeated.
December 18: The third amendment establishing the abolition of slavery was ratified. -
April 11: The Paris treaty is ratified, Spain ceded Puerto Rico to the United States.
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January 1: The Emancipation Act for southern slaves enters into force.
June 20: West Virginia becomes the 35th state in the Union.
September 19: Battle of Chickamauga. This battle is the Union's most important defeat to the west during the Civil War. -
February 20: The Battle of Olustee. It was the largest battle to occur in the state of Florida during the war.
August 2: Battle of Mobile Bay. It was important to the Union, as it left the Confederacy without ports after the capture of the port of Savannah, in Georgia. This fact helped the re-election of Abraham Lincoln as president.
