Brief Timeline of Events Leading up to World War one

Brief Timeline of Important Events

1820

March - The Missouri Compromise is negotiated allowing Maine to be admitted to the Union as a free state and Missouri as a slave state in 1821. This act will maintain a balance between free and slave states. The compromise establishes the 36 degree, 30' parallel of latitude as a dividing line between free and slave areas of the territories.

1827

The state of New York abolishes slavery.

1828

Congress again raises tariffs with the Tariff of Abominations. The tariffs are designed to support American industry and in that way are successful greatly benefiting the northern industrial economy, however the tariffs are damaging to the southern agricultural economy.

August - The Nat Turner Rebellion in Southampton County, Virginia. Over 60 whites were killed in the uprising. Turner was on the run for or nearly two months, but was eventually caught and hanged.

1832

The Tariff Act of 1832 reduces duties. The South, still dissatisfied threatens secession. South Carolina's legislature organizes an army and declare the tariffs null and void.

1833

A Compromise Tariff Act is passed as a means of gradually reducing the tariffs of concern in the southern states. Confrontation is averted with this compromise.

1834

Slavery abolished throughout the British Empire.

1836

May - The House passes a resolution that automatically tables or postponed action on all petitions relating to slavery without hearing them. Stricter versions of this gag rule are passed in succeeding Congresses.

June - Arkansas becomes the twenty fifth state and enters the Union as an as a slave state.

1837

January - Michigan becomes the twenty sixth state and enters the Union as a free state.

November - Abolitionist publisher Elijah P. Lovejoy is murdered in Alton, Illinois and his printing press is thrown in the river. He had been calling for an end to slavery.

1838

Lead by black abolitionist Robert Purvis, the Underground Railroad is formally organized.

1845

Former slave, Frederick Douglass, publishes his autobiography - Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass.

December 1846

Iowa becomes the twenty ninth state and enters the Union as a free state in 1846.

1849

Harriet Tubman escapes from slavery in Maryland. She reportedly returned to the South 19 times and brought out more than 300 slaves.

1850

September - Congress implements several measures forming the Compromise of 1850. The measures included California joining the Union as a free state, the territories of New Mexico and Utah are organized with no restrictions on slavery, slave trading is abolished in the District of Columbia effective January 1851 and the Fugitive Slave Act of 1793 is modified and strengthened to allow slaveholders to retrieve slaves in northern states and free territories.

California becomes the thirty first state and enters the Union as a free state in 1850.

1852

Harriet Beecher Stowe publishes Uncle Tom's Cabin as a response to the pro-slavery movement.

1854

The Kansas-Nebraska Act passes Congress and thus overturns the Missouri Compromise opening the Northern territory to slavery.