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1688

• Germantown Quaker Petition Against Slavery

  The Germantown Protest was the first large scale, organized slave protest in America. 4 Pennsylvania German-Dutch Quakers based the protest on the bible and the golden rule.
  

  1712

• New York Conspiracy

  After a series of mysterious fires in New York, suspicion turned to the Black population. A 16 year old white indentured servant girl was offered freedom and 100pounds to reveal the conspiracy. She named a tavern owner, two slaves and a prostitute as being part of a conspiracy. the servant soon named more blacks who were hanged. the witch hunt only ended when she began to accuse wealthy and prominent individuals as being conspirators. The final toll was 18 blacks hanged, 13 burned alive and 70 deported.
  

  1722

• The Somerset Decision (Somerset v Stewart, King's Bench, 22 June 1772)

  Since the English Magna Carta (1215), persons being detained have a right to know the charges and can force their being released by demanding to be informed of the charges; if not, release is instant (writ of habeas corpus). Slaves were being detained without charge. A habeas corpus case was filed in the case of James Sommerset v. Charles Stewart. With King's Bench, Lord Chief Justice Mansfield [1705-1793] presiding, all slaves held in Great Britain were freed (1772).
  

  1739

• Stono Rebellion/Catos conspiracy

  A group of slaves marched down the road killing all the whites they found and being joined by more slaves. they soon entered a firearms shop, killed the owner and armed themselves. One white man escaped and sounded the alarm. When it was over, 64 blacks and whites lay dead. After his event slaves were no longer allowed to grown food, assemble in groups, earn money or learn to read.
  

  1776

• The Declaration of Independence

• Thomas Jefferson drafted the Declaration and in his original draft he had language condemning King George for complicity in the slave trade. An obviously hypocritical statement, this language was edited from the final version along with 1/4th of the original text. Jefferson and a large number of congressmen were slave owners at the time. . Notably the words, " all men are created equal", did not apply to slaves, or women.
  

  1777

• Vermont Outlaws Slavery

  In 1777 the area known as Vermont declared it's independence form New York and wrote a constitution banning slavery. The section of chapter 1 was modeled after the declaration of independence in that it stated, "no male person, born in this country, or brought from over sea, ought to be holden by law, to serve any person, as a servant, slave or apprentice, after he arrives to the age of twenty-one Years, nor female, in like manner, after she arrives to the age of eighteen years." by 1790, 6 of the original 13 colonies had banned slavery
  
  

  1780

• Pennsylvania's Gradual Emancipation Law

  Once Pennsylvania lost its lower counties to the new state of Delaware (1776), 3/4ths of the slaves were lost. Slaves born after the law had to wait 28 years before the law set them free. The law immediately lifted restrictions on free blacks. They were given the freedoms of whites except the right to vote.

• The Underground Railroad begins

  The number of homes and individuals used to provide assistance to move slaves to free parts began to proliferate to the extent that by 1780, it began to be called the Underground Railroad. Contrary to present day notions, there was no vast coordinated system, rather, dozens of networks, unbeknownst to one another.
  

  1784

• The Land Ordinance of 1784

  Written by Thomas Jefferson, the Land ordinance was the first attempt by the United States to deal with the Louisiana Purchase. After the Louisiana Purchase, The Treaty of Paris that officially ended the revolutionary war, ceded English lands east of the Mississippi and south of the Great Lakes to the United States. Several states sought to claim these new lands along with settlers and native tribes. The Ordinance of 1784 asserted Federal authority over the lands and called for the creation of 10 new states. Jefferson wrote a provision into the ordinance which prohibited slavery in the lands, but Congress threw it out.
  

  1785

• The Land Ordinance of 1785

  The Land Ordinance of 1785 established land policy in the Ohio lands by subdividing the lands into townships of 6 miles on each side. The ordinance added upon the ordinance of 1784 by providing a mechanism for settling and selling the land. Together with the ordinance of 1784 and the Northwest Ordinance, the new lands of the United States were slowly brought under the control of the United States.
  

  1787

• The Northwest Ordinance

  The Northwest Ordinance established how the United States would expand into new western territory and admit new states. The ordinance also set up a prohibition of slavery in the territory, established the Ohio River as the boundary between free and slave territory and mandated that a new state would be created in the region once population reached 60,000. The Enabling Act of 1802 provided further details for the creation of states The Natural Rights provisions of the ordinance foreshadowed the Bill of Rights, the first ten amendments to the U.S. Constitution.

• The United States Constitution

  Although The Constitution never uses the word, "Slavery", it contained several clauses in protection of slavery.

• Article 1, Section 2, Paragraph 3, 3/5ths Clause

  "Representatives and direct Taxes shall be apportioned among the several States which may be included within this Union, according to their respective Numbers, which shall be determined by adding to the whole Number of free Persons, including those bound to Service for a Term of Years, and excluding Indians not taxed, three fifths of all other Persons."

• Article 1, Section 9, Importation of Slaves

  "The Migration or Importation of such Persons as any of the States now existing shall think proper to admit, shall not be prohibited by the Congress prior to the Year one thousand eight hundred and eight, but a tax or duty may be imposed on such Importation, not exceeding ten dollars for each Person.".

• Article 4, Section 2, Fugitive Slave Clause

  "No Person held to Service or Labour in one State, under the Laws thereof, escaping into another, shall, in Consequence of any Law or Regulation therein, be discharged from such Service or Labour, but shall be delivered up on Claim of the Party to whom Service or Labour may be due."

  1789

• Publication of, The Interesting Narrative and the Life of Oluadah Equiano or Augustus Vassa,

  Oluadah, a slave captured in Africa and enslaved in The new world, travelled between the new world and England several times over. He was eventually able to purchase his own freedom and becomes instrumental in the abolition of slavery in England.

• U.S. Presidential Slave Holders

  George Washington, owner of approximately 250 slaves becomes the first of 12 Presidential Slaveholders. Approximately 1/4th of U.S. Presidents (12) owned slaves: George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, James Monroe, Andrew Jackson, Martin Van Buren, William Henry Harrison, John Tyler, James Polk, Zachary Taylor, Andrew Johnson and Ulysses S. Grant.
  The fact that 12 of the first 16 U.S. Presidents were slaveholders, along with a majority of slave state representatives, made slavey and it's economic and political interest the most significant factor in American politics up to the end of The Civil War.
  

  1790

• Compromise of 1790

  The Compromise of 1790 was the first of several political compromises agreed to between Northern and Southern states for the sake of preserving The Union. Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, Alexander Hamilton and George Washington, brokered a deal that resulted in the Residence act and the funding act. The compromise allowed the federal government to accept the costs of the revolutionary war, in exchange for the capitol being located on the Potomac river (donated by Maryland, a slave state).
  

  1793

• Fugitive Slave Act of 1793

  This act was officially called "An Act respecting fugitives from justice, and persons escaping from the service of their masters." The Fugitive Slave Clause of the U.S. Constitution (Article 4, Section 2, Note: Superseded by the Thirteenth Amendment) guaranteed the right of a slaveholder to recover an escaped slave. The Fugitive Slave Act of 1793 created the legal mechanism by which that could be accomplished. Escaped slaves could be seized in any state, brought before a magistrate and returned to their masters. The law made it a crime to assist a fugitive or a slave in escaping. The Act made every escaped slave a fugitive for life who could be recaptured at any time anywhere within the territory of the United States, along with any children subsequently born of enslaved mothers.
  

  1794

• The Slave Trade Act of 1794

  The Slave Trade Act of 1794 limited American involvement in the trade of human cargo. This was the first of several acts of Congress that eventually stopped the importation of slaves and also prohibited making, loading, outfitting, equipping, or dispatching of any ship to be used in the trade of slaves.

• Eli Whitney invents The Cotton Gin

  The modern version of the cotton gin was created by the American inventor Eli Whitney in 1793 to mechanize the cleaning of cotton. Cotton production expanded from 750,000 bales in 1830 to 2.85 million bales in 1850. The number of slaves rose from 700,000, before Eli Whitney's patent, to around 3.2 million in 1850 and by 1860 the United States' was providing eighty percent of Great Britain's cotton and also providing two-thirds of the world supply.
  

  1798 and 1799

• Kentucky and Virginia resolutions

  The Kentucky and Virginia Resolutions were written secretly by Vice President Thomas Jefferson and James Madison, respectively and were political statements in which the Kentucky and Virginia legislatures took the position that the federal Alien and Sedition Acts were unconstitutional. They argued that the Constitution was a "compact" among the states. Therefore, the federal government had no right to exercise powers not specifically delegated to it by The Constitution, therefore, the states had the right and the duty to declare unconstitutional any acts of Congress that were not authorized by the Constitution. In doing so, they argued for states rights. Their influence reverberated right up to the Nullification Crisis and The Civil War.
  

  1800

• Gabriel Prosser Insurrection

  Gabriel Prosser, was a literate enslaved blacksmith. Whites as well as blacks regarded the literate young man as "a fellow of great courage and intellect above his rank in life" who planned to lead a large slave rebellion in the Richmond area in the summer of 1800. Information regarding the revolt was leaked prior to its execution, thus Gabriel's plans were foiled and twenty-five members of the revolt were hanged. In reaction, the Virginia and other legislatures passed restrictions on free blacks, as well as the education, movement and hiring out of the enslaved.
  

  1803

• The Louisiana Purchase

  828,000 square miles of land obtained in The Louisiana Purchase was acquired by the United States of America in 1803. The U.S. paid $11,250,000 plus cancelled French debt of $3,750,000. The Louisiana Purchase encompassed all or part of 15 current U.S. states and two Canadian provinces. The purchase, which doubled the size of the United States, comprises around 23% of current U.S. lands. Over the course of the following years, struggles over how the land was to be incorporated into the nation was the root of fierce debates in congress over the question of slavery. How these questions were settled would determine Presidents, Wars, the rights of laborers and the fate of over 3.2 million enslaved African descendants.
  

  1807

• The Act Prohibiting Importation of Slaves of 1807

  This Act stated that no new slaves were permitted to be imported into the United States. This act effectively ended the legal transatlantic slave trade. The United States Constitution, Article 1 Section 9 protected the slave trade for twenty years. Only starting January 1, 1808 could laws become effective to end the slave trade. In part, to ensure passage of such a law, the Pennsylvania Abolition Society was formed.
  

  1812

• The War of 1812

  This war was fought chiefly on the Atlantic Ocean and on the land, coasts and waterways of North America, there were several immediate stated causes for the U.S. declaration of war: first, a series of trade restrictions introduced by Britain to impede American trade with France, a country with which Britain was at war; second, the forced recruitment of U.S. seamen into the Royal Navy; third, the British military support for American Indians who were offering armed resistance to the expansion of the American frontier to the Northwest.

• Tunis Campbell (1812-1891)

  Tunis Campbell was an African American politician of the 19th century, and a major figure in Reconstruction Georgia. In 1867, with a goal to help freedmen vote, Campbell was appointed to the Board of Registration in Georgia. He was elected to congress as a senator in Georgia in 1868. He was able to return to office in 1871, but lost in 1872 and eventually imprisoned in a Georgia labor camp before fleeing the state.
  

  1816

• American Colonization Society founded

  The Society for the Colonization of Free People of Color of America, was the primary vehicle to support the return of free African Americans to Africa. It helped to found the colony of Liberia in 1821 and its founders were Henry Clay, John Randolph, and Richard Bland Lee and Paul Cuffee, a wealthy mixed-race New England shipowner and activist, was an early advocate of settling freed blacks in Africa. He gained support from black leaders and members of the US Congress for an emigration plan.
  

  1819

• The Tallmadge Amendment

  The Tallmadge Amendment was submitted during the debate regarding the admission of Missouri as a state. Tallmadge, an opponent of slavery, sought to impose conditions on Missouri that would extinguish slavery within a generation. Although the Tallmadge Amendment passed in the House, the Senate, which held a balance of slave and free states, passed a version of the Missouri statehood bill without the amendment.
  

  1820

• An Act To Protect The Commerce of The United States and Punish the Crime of Piracy

  is an 1819 United States federal statute against piracy, amended in 1820 to declare the slave trade and robbing a ship to be piracy as well. The last execution for piracy in the United States was of slave trader Nathaniel Gordon in 1862 under the amended act.
  
  

• An Act to Continue In Force

  "An act to protect the commerce of the United States and punish the crime of piracy," and also to make further provisions for punishing the crime of piracy: sometimes known as the 1820 Piracy Law. It also added three additional types of piracy: in section 3, robbery of a ship, its crew, or contents is declared piracy, punishable by death; in section 4, to seize or "deco" onto a ship"any negro or mulatto, not held to service or labour by the laws of either of the states or territories of the United States with intent to make such negro or mulatto a slave" is also declared piracy punishable by death; and in section 5, attempting to confine, deliver, or sell a negro or mulatto (similarly qualified as "not held to service", etc.) is also declared piracy punishable by death. The act was made "perpetual" by the 17th United States Congress, enacted January 30, 1823.

• The Missouri Compromise

  The Missouri Compromise was an agreement passed in 1820 between the pro-slavery and anti-slavery factions in the United States Congress, involving primarily the regulation of slavery in the western territories. It prohibited slavery in the former Louisiana Territory north of the parallel 36degrees, 36minutes north except within the boundaries of the proposed state of Missouri. Prior to the agreement, the House of Representatives had refused to accept this compromise and a conference committee was appointed. The two houses were at odds not only on the issue of slavery, but also on the parliamentary question of the inclusion of Maine and Missouri within the same bill. The committee recommended the enactment of two laws, one for the admission of Maine as a free state and Missouri as a slave state.
  

  1822

• Liberia Founded

  The African Nation/State of Liberia was purchased and founded by Henry Clay and the American Colonization Society for the voluntary repatriation of former U.S. Slaves. The issue of repatriation was divisive and found both favor and rejection by Blacks and Whites leaders alike. The positive notion was one of living free, and without prejudice and under Black autonomy. On the malevolent side many racists did not believe that Blacks had a role to play in America and never could be equal or true citizens.
• Denmark Vesey insurrection
  

  1828

• Tariff Act of 1828

  The tariff act of 1828 (also known as the tariff of abominations) was protectionist in nature and a response to the United States economic downturn of the 1820's. Northern industry was harmed by the low cost of imports. The tariff added to the costs of such imports to help even the playing field. Due to the divide between the agricultural south and industrial north, the tariff had a stronger economic impact on the south. The south, being heavily dependent on agriculture and cotton exports was able to purchase cheaper british goods to acquire all that it had failed to produce for itself. Also, the higher costs of importation passed onto the British and other nations reduced their profits which made it more difficult for them to purchase cotton from the south. The tariff act of 1828 and other tariff acts illustrated differences between the northern and southern states, which pushed the nation towards the nullification crisis of 1832.
  

  1831

• Nat Turner Rebellion

  The Nat Turner rebellion was the most widespread and notorious of America's slave insurrections. The effect of the rebellion was a further reduction in the limited freedoms granted to free blacks and added restrictions and conditions imposed on travel by enslaved blacks. Many blacks were whipped, killed and beaten in the which hunt and persecutions that followed the insurrection. Laws were created to suppress Black gatherings and meetings. The insurrection also further dispelled the southern myth of a patriarchal southern slave relationship, and added fuel to abolitionist calls for the ending of slavery.
  

  1832

• The Tariff Act of 1832

  Written by John Quincy Adams, the Tariff Act of 1832 was an attempt to reduce tariff's to appease the south. The south still objected and tariff's would be further reduced by the compromise tariff of 1833. Half of southern states were satisfied with the reduced tariff's and voted in support of the act.
  

  1832

• Nullification Crisis

  South Carolinas Ordinance of Nullification essentialy asserted states rights by voicing the opinion that the Tariffs of 1828, '32 and '33 were not the rule of law in South Carolina. South Carolina made military preparations to defend itself from Federal intervention and the U.S. government passed a force bill to prepare for military intervention and also reduced tariff's further by the compromise tariff of 1833. This response succeeded in South Carolina reversing it's nullification and falling in line with other states.
  

  1833

• A Compromise Tariff of 1833

  further reduced tariff's from the tariff of 1832 and agreed to cut tariff's over the next decade to reach 1816 levels which were 20% of the value of imports.

• The American Anti-Slavery Society

  founded by William Lloyd Garrison and Arthur Tappan and supported by escaped slaves Frederick Douglass and William Wells Brown it was the nations leading abolitionist organization and counted among it's members such abolitionist luminaries as Theodore Dwight Weld, Lewis Tappan, James G. Birney, Lydia Maria Child, Maria Weston Chapman, Abby Kelley Foster, Stephen Symonds Foster, Henry Highland Garnet, Samuel Cornish, James Forten, Charles Lenox Remond, Lucy Stone, Robert Purvis, and Wendell Phillips.
  

  1834

• Lane Seminary Debates

  Lane Seminary was founded in 1829 as westernmost Presbyterian Seminary. Lyman Beecher, the father of Harriet Beecher was the founding President of the Seminary and stood in his post during the debates of 1834. The debates were over the proposed solutions to slavery (immediate abolition vs. colonization) and extended over 9 days of 2 and 1/2 hours each night: "Ought the people of the slaveholding states to abolish slavery immediately?", and "Are the doctrines, tendencies, and measures of the American Colonization Society (founders of Liberia and supporters of colonization), and the influence of its principal supporters, such as render it worthy of the patronage of the Christian public?". The conclusion of the debate was that slavery was wrong and that colonization was not the answer, rather abolition and citizenship. The school gained notoriety for the radical opinions of the students and 40 of the students asked to be dismissed by the school, whereupon they were extended an invitation to attend Oberlin college. Most notable among the students was the lead organizer of the debates, Theodore Dwight Weld, a famous abolitionist, future husband of Angelina Grimke and author of "American Slavery As It Is: Testimony of a Thousand Witnesses"

• Great Britain outlaws slavery

  The Slavery Abolition Act 1833 by Parliament abolished slavery throughout most of the British Empire, including Jamaica, but excluding territories held under the East India Company and Ceylon. The Somerset decision of 1772 only abolished slavery within Great Britain.
  

  1836

• House Gag Rule

  Between 1836 and 1844, the U.S. House of Representatives adopted a series of resolutions and rules that banned petitions calling for the abolition of slavery. Known as gag rules, these measures effectively tabled antislavery petitions without submitting them to usual House procedures. Public outcry over the gag rules ultimately aided the antislavery cause, and the fierce House debate concerning their future anticipated later conflicts over slavery.
  

  1839

• The Amistad

  The slaveship La Amistad was commandeered by African Captives and sailed to Long Island, whereupon it became a symbol of American abolitionist sentiment. The case revolved around the fate of the slaves and eventually went to the U.S. Supreme Court, represented by former President John Quincy Adams. In 1841, the US Supreme Court ruled that the Africans had been illegally transported and held as slaves, and ordered them freed. The Amistad survivors returned to Africa in 1842.

• Theodore Dwight Weld Writes, American Slavery As It Is: Testimony of 1000 Witnesses

  The book chronicles newspaper and personal accounts of the horrors of slavery. it for once and for all settled the myth of a gentle, paternalistic/symbiotic relationship between slaves and slave owners. Not for the faint-hearted, this book contains perhaps the most blood filled collection of sadistic, inhumane death filled and cruel personal accounts of man's cruelty to man ever assembled.
  

  1842

  Prigg v. Pennsylvania

  Slave catcher Prigg was hired to abduct a runaway slave by the name of Margaret Morgan who moved to Pennsylvania from Maryland. Prigg also sold two of her children that were born free. Prigg was convicted under Pennsylvania law. Prigg then appealed to the U.S. Supreme court stating that state law could not superceede federal law. (the fugitive slave act). The court agreed and overturned Prigg's conviction.
  

  1846

• The Wilmot Proviso

  The Wilmot Proviso, introduced in congress, would have banned slavery in any territory to be acquired from Mexico in the Mexican War. Congressman David Wilmot first introduced the Proviso in the United States House of Representatives on August 8, 1846 as a rider on a $2,000,000 appropriations bill. It passed the House but failed in the Senate. It was reintroduced in February 1847 and again passed the House and failed in the Senate. In 1848, an attempt to make it part of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo also failed.

• The Mexican-American War

  The Mexican American War, from 1846 to 1848 was in response to the annexation of Texas in 1845, following lands gained during the Texas revolution. American forces invaded New Mexico, and California while the Navy conducted a blockade. Another American army captured Mexico City, and forced Mexico to agree to the cession of its northern territories to the U.S. The majority of U.S. soldiers died due to disease and not the conflict itself. The goal of the war was American expansion. The war was highly controversial and anti-slavery elements strongly opposed it. In the end the former Mexican territories were gained for $18 million and debt forgiveness. The new territories raised the question of whether slavery was to be permitted. This debate was yet another issue in the run up to civil war.
  

  1850

• Compromise of 1850: 5 bills

• 1 California admitted as a free state
• 2 Utah and New Mexico Territory created: issue of slavery to be decided by sovereignty
• 3 Texas concedes land to New Mexico, and the creation of unorganized territory to the northeast
• 4 Slave Trade abolished in Washington D.C (but not slavery itself)
• 5 The Fugitive Slave Act was strengthened
• The Georgia Platform
  
  

  1852

• Harriet Beecher Stowe Writes, Uncle Tom's Cabin

  Politically, Uncle Tom's Cabin was immensely important. The novel was first released in weekly editions in The National Era newspaper. For the vast majority of American's, the novel was their first experience with the effect of slavery on individual lives. The story, told mainly from the perspective of 3 slaves, stretches from the deepest south to the Canadian border and beyond. At the time it was the nation's and the world's best selling novel
  

  1854

• Kansas-Nebraska Act

  The Kansas Nebraska Act, brokered by Stephen A. Douglas repealed the Missouri Compromise and opened up the new territories of Kansas and Nebraska to new settlers who would be allowed to settle the issue of slavery by popular sovereignty (vote). The act was originally created to aid in the creation of the transcontinental railroad. The deal was a serious miscalculation by Douglas who did not properly gauge how the law would be interpreted by anti-slavery forces. In response to this Democratic concession to the slave power of the south, The Republican party was formed, and within 2 years, it would very nearly win the Presidency.

• The Republican Party is Formed

  The Republican Party (GOP) emerged in 1854 as an anti-slavery party andto combat the Kansas Nebraska Act which threatened to extend slavery into the territories, and to promote a national railroad to facilitate the nations manifest destiny and to fuel the industrial revolution. With the election of Abraham Lincoln in 1860, southern democrats saw the writing on the wall. Lincoln's election lead o the Succession Crisis and the eventual beginning of The War Between States (The Civil War).

• The Ostend Manifesto

  Cuba's annexation had long been a goal of U.S. expansionists, particularly as the U.S. set its sights southward following the admission of California to the Union. The Ostend Manifesto justified the use of force to seize Cuba. When it was published, it was immediately denounced in both the Northern states and Europe ending any possibility of Cuba's annexation.
  
  

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