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Florida, a slave state, is admitted to the United States
Florida, a slave state, is admitted to the United States.
Significance: It added to slave states which made the north absolutely angered. -
Manifest Destiny
Manifest Destiny was a phrase which invoked the idea of divine sanction for the territorial expansion of the United States.Newspaper editor John O'Sullivan coined the term Manifest Destiny in 1845.
Significance: It was the primary force that caused the United States to expand west across North America. Americans' expansion offered self-advancement, self-sufficiency, income and freedom. -
The Mexican-American War
The Mexican-American War (1846-1848) marked the first U.S. armed conflict chiefly fought on foreign soil. Mexico is angered and concerned at the Texas Annexation and the U.S. and the Mexico go to the war in 1846, beginning the Mexican-American War. An Illinois congressman, Abraham Lincoln, supports the Spot Resolution, legislature that requires the U.S. to figure out exactly where American blood was spilled. -
The Oregon Treaty
Meanwhile in 1846, the U.S. acquires the Oregon territory. Britain also claims this land and both nations come to the agreement to postpone any fighting as both countries begin to pour on settlers. James Polk’s slogan becomes “Fifty- Four Forty or Fight!” (Line of latitude between 40 and 54 is disputed territory). In 1846, a treaty is signed that divides the territory basically into two, creating the modern-day border between Canada and the U.S. -
California Gold Rush
The California Gold Rush suddenly populates Northern California with Northern and immigrant settlers who outnumber Southerner settlers. California's constitutional convention unanimously rejects slavery and petitions to join the union as a free state without first being organized as a territory.[135] President Taylor asks Congress to admit California as a free state, saying he will suppress secession if it is attempted by any dissenting states.[141 -
Wisconsin is Free
Wisconsin was made a free state, oppose to a slave state. -
William H. Seward
U.S. Senator William H. Seward of New York delivers his "Higher Law" address. He states that a compromise on slavery is wrong because under a higher law than the Constitution, the law of God, all men are free and equal. -
The Compromise of 1850
The Compromise of 1850 allows California to be admitted to the Union as the Free State. Wilmot Proviso’s attempt to ban slavery is passed by the House, but not the Senate. The Compromise also allows other territories in the West, like Utah and New Mexico, to decide slavery by popular sovereignty. Finally, the slave trade was banned in Washington, D.C. -
The Kansas Nebraska Act
Congress enacts the Kansas-Nebraska Act, providing that popular sovereignty, a vote of the people when a territory is organized, will decide "all questions pertaining to slavery" in the Kansas-Nebraska territories. This abrogates the Missouri Compromise prohibition of slavery north of the 36°30´ line of latitude and increases Northerners' fears of a Slave Power encroaching on the North. Both Northerners and Southerners rush to the Kansas and Nebraska territories to express their opinion in -
Ostend Manifesto
The Ostend Manifesto, a dispatch sent from France by the U.S. ministers to Britain, France and Spain after a meeting in Ostend, Belgium, describes the rationale for the United States to purchase Cuba (a territory which had slavery) from Spain and implies the U.S. should declare war if Spain refuses to sell the island. Four months after the dispatch is drafted, it is published in full at the request of the U.S. House of Representatives. Northern states view the document as a Southern attempt to e -
Bleeding Kansas
Violence by pro-slavery looters from Missouri known as Border Ruffians and anti-slavery groups known as Jayhawkers breaks out in "Bleeding Kansas" as pro-slavery and anti-slavery supporters try to organize the territory as slave or free. Many Ruffians vote illegally in Kansas. Estimates will show that the violence in Kansas resulted in about 200 persons killed and $2 million worth of property destroyed during the middle and late 1850s. Over 95 percent of the pro-slavery votes in the election of -
Dred Scott v. Sanford
The U.S. Supreme Court reaches the Dred Scott v. Sandford decision, a 7 to 2 ruling that Congress lacks the power to exclude slavery from the territories, that slaves are property and have no rights as citizens and that slaves are not made free by living in free territory. Chief Justice Roger B. Taney concludes that the Missouri Compromise is unconstitutional. If a court majority clearly agreed (which it did not in this decision), this conclusion would allow all territories to be open to slavery -
Oregon strikes again!
Oregon admitted as a free state that prohibits the residency of any person of African origin: slave or free. -
The Election of 1860
The United States presidential election of 1860 was the 19th quadrennial presidential election. The election was held on Tuesday, November 6, 1860, and served as the immediate impetus for the outbreak of the American Civil War. The United States had been divided during the 1850s on questions surrounding the expansion of slavery and the rights of slave owners. In 1860, these issues broke the Democratic Party into Northern and Southern factions, and a new Constitutional Union Party appeared. In th -
The Civil War
The American Civil War, widely known in the United States as simply the Civil War as well as other sectional names, was a civil war fought from 1861 to 1865 to determine the survival of the Union or independence for the Confederacy.
