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1684
The first ship with slaves arrived to America. -
Congress banned slave ships coming from Africa
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The Missouri Compromise
Slavery would be permitted in Missouri and Arkansas but banned in the west and north of Missouri. -
Argument over import duties
-Northern states favored such duties: they
protected their young industries against the
competition goods.
-Southern states opposed them: they
relied upon fo reign manufacturers for both
necessities and luxuries of many kinds. -
US divided the Oregon Territory with Britain
-
US took vast areas of the Southwest from Mexico
-
Congress voted in favor of another compromise
California was admitted to the United
States as a free state, while people who lived in Utah
and New Mexico were given the right to decide for
themselves whether or not to allow slavery. -
Fugitive Slave Act
It made it easier for southerners to capture slaves who had escaped from their masters. The law called for severe penalties to those who assisted these black people.
This act angered northerners. Some refused to accept it. Other started providing help to fugitives. -
Congress ended the Missouri Compromise
There was so much killing and violence that the state started to be called “bleeding Kansas”. -
1858
Congress delayed its admission to the United States. But the supporters of slavery won a victory of another sort.
A slave Dred Scott had been taken by his owner to live in a free state. Scott asked the Supreme Court to declare that this had made him legally free. The Court refused. -
Lincoln gets elected
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Confederate forces opened fire
Confederate forces opened fire in Fort Sumter, South Carolina, (occupied by United States troops). This marked the beginning of the war.
The Confederacy was led by Jefferson Davis, and the Union by Lincoln. -
1861
The Union kept losing battles in Virginia, but had more luck in the Mississippi valley. -
Inauguration of Abraham Lincoln
Amid all the chaos and uncertainty, Abraham Lincoln was inaugurated as the President of the Union. -
Civil War starts
The war officially started with the shots fired by Confederate troops at Fort Sumter in Charleston, South Carolina. -
Abraham calls for military action against rebels
In a special session of Congress, Lincoln asked for 75,000 people to help defeat the rebels. A couple of weeks later, in May, Lincoln called for another 43000 soldiers, to help win the war. -
Secession
Eleven southern states announced that they were now an independent nation: The Confederate States of America:
Alabama, Georgia, Florida, South Carolina, North Carolina, Mississippi, Virginia, Texas, Tennessee, Oklahoma, the governments of Maryland, Kentucky, and Missouri. -
The Union captured New Orleans
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The Emancipation Proclamation
It was passed by Lincoln and declared that all slaves living in the Confederacy were to make free. -
The Union captured Vicksburg
The Union armies were closing on
all important Confederate stronghold on the
Mississippi called Vicksburg, -
Battle of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania
The Union restored its morale by defeating the Confederates in the Battle of Gettysburg. -
The Gettysburg Address
a speech that Abraham Lincoln made
there a few months later in which expressed certain principles of the democratic government. -
1864
The Union marched into Georgia, and occupied Savannah. Then they marched to North and South Carolina, burning and destroying everything and they wanted to reach Richmond, Virginia. -
The Confederacy surrendered in Appomattox
-
Congress approves 13th Amendment
Slavery was officially abolished after the approval of the 13th Amendment to the USA Constitution. -
President Lincoln was assassinated in Washington
He was succeeded by Andrew Johnson, his vice president. -
Congress passed the Civil Rights Act
Despite opposition from the President. It also set up the Freedmen’s Bureau. Both were intended to ensure black people’s rights in the South. -
14th Amendment
14th Amendment to Constitution gave blacks the right to citizenships, including the right to vote. All former Confederates except Tennessee refused to accept it. -
Congress passed the Reconstruction Act
This placed all white governments in the South under military rule. -
All southern states had “Reconstruction” governments.
Most were made up of blacks, a few white southerners who were wiling to work with them and white men from the North.
These southern Democrats claimed
that the Reconstruction govermnments were
incompetent and dishonest. Many of the new black members of the
state assemblies were inexperienced and poorly
educated. -
1876
Only three states had Reconstruction governments. -
Congress withdrew federal troops from the South
-Black people were more and more treated as “second class citizens” and robbed of their right to vote.
-Some states prevented blacks from voting by introducing a poll tax, which was so high that black people couldn’t pay it. -
Some states introduced segregation
Supreme Court ruling: the Constitution allowed separate facilities and services to be provided for black and black people as long as the facilities were of equal quality: “separate but equal”.
