Timeline 1820-1861

  • Missouri Compromise

    The Missouri Compromise was the U.S federal legislation that stopped Northern attempts to prohibit slavery's expansion by admitting Missouri as a slave state.
  • Texas becomes a State

    In 1844, Congress finally agreed to annex the territory of Texas. Texas entered the U.S as a slave state.
  • Compromise of 1850

    Five laws passed in September of 1850 that consisted of the issue of slavery. It was important because it made California a free state.
  • Fugitive Slave Law

    The Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 was a part of the Compromise of 1850. This act means that slaves are required to return to their owners.
  • Republican Party Forms

    The Republican Party emerged in 1854 to combat the Kansas-Nebraska Act and expansion of slavery.
  • Kansas-Nebraska Act

    The Kansas-Nebraska Act repealed the Missouri Compromise, created two territories, and allowed for popular sovereignty.
  • Dress Scott case

    The U.S Supreme Court ruling on March 6, 1857. It was about having lived in a free state and territory did not entitle an enslaved person.
  • John Browns attack on Harpers Ferry

    Abolitionist John Brown leads a small group on a raid against a federal armory in Harpers Ferry, Virginia. He did this in attempt to start an armed revolt of enslaved people.
  • Lincoln Elected President

    Lincoln was elected President. He was in the Republican Party and got 180 electoral votes. His home state was Illinois.
  • Fort Sumter Attack

    After a 33-hour bombardment by Confederate cannons, Union forces surrender in South Carolina's Charleston harbor.
  • South Carolina Secedes

    South Carolina became the first staled seceded on December 20, 1860. They wanted to secede because to increase hostility on the part of non-slaveholding States.
  • Confederate States of America form

    Representative from six seceded states met in Montgomery, Alabama to establish a unified government.