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Slaves Arrive in America - 1619
Slavery in America began when the first African slaves were brought to the North American colony of Jamestown, Virginia, in 1619, to aid in the production of such lucrative crops as tobacco. -
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Abolition Timespan
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Fugitive Slave Act 1
Enacted by Congress in 1793, the first Fugitive Slave Act authorized local governments to seize and return escaped slaves to their owners and imposed penalties on anyone who aided in their flight. -
International Slave Trade Abolished
The US makes international slave trade a felony in Act Prohibiting Importation of Slaves. -
Missouri Compromise
Congress reached a series of agreements that became known as the Missouri Compromise. Missouri was admitted as a slave state and Maine was admitted as a free state, preserving the Congressional balance. A line was also drawn through the unincorporated western territories along the 36⁰30 parallel, dividing north and south as free and slave. -
Wilmot Proviso
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 intended for the final negotiations to resolve the Mexican–American War (this was three months into the two-year war). -
Fugitive Slave Act 2
Widespread resistance to the 1793 law later led to the passage of the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850, which added further provisions regarding runaways and levied even harsher punishments for interfering in their capture. -
Compromise of 1850
With national relations soured by the debate over the Wilmot Proviso, senators Henry Clay and Stephen Douglas managed to broker a shaky accord with the Compromise of 1850. The compromise prevented further territorial expansion of slavery while strengthening the Fugitive Slave Act, a law which compelled Northerners to seize and return escaped slaves to the South. -
Uncle Tom’s Cabin Published
Uncle Tom’s Cabin was the second-best-selling book in America in the 19th century, second only to the Bible. Its popularity brought the issue of slavery to life for those few who remained unmoved after decades of legislative conflict and widened the division between North and South. -
Bleeding Kansas
( 1854 - 1861 )
Pro- and anti-slavery agitators flocked to Kansas, hoping to shift the decision by sheer weight of numbers. The two factions struggled for five years with sporadic outbreaks of bloodshed that claimed fifty-six lives. Although both territories eventually ratified anti-slavery constitutions, the violence shocked and troubled the nation. -
Kansas-Nebraska Act
The Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854, narrowly passed while Congressmen brandished weapons and uttered death threats in the House chambers, overturned parts of the Missouri Compromise by allowing the settlers in the two territories to determine whether or not to permit slavery by a popular vote. -
Dred Scott v. Sanford Supreme Court Case
Dred Scott was a Virginia slave who tried to sue for his freedom in court. The case eventually rose to the level of the Supreme Court, where the justices found that, as a slave, Dred Scott was a piece of property that had none of the legal rights or recognitions afforded to a human being. -
John Brown’s Raid on Harper’s Ferry
John Brown cut his teeth as a killer as an anti-slavery “Jayhawker” during Bleeding Kansas. In mid-October of 1859, the crusading abolitionist organized a small band of white allies and free blacks and raided a government arsenal in Harpers Ferry, Virginia.
