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Compromise of 1850
Once again, Henry Clay worked to shape a compromise that both the North & the South could accept. Clay presented to the Senate a series of resolutions later called the Compromise of 1850. They proposed a new and more effective fugitive slave law. Provided that California be admitted as a free state. After eight months of effort, the Compromise of 1850 became law. -
The Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854
To Senator Stephen Douglas, popular sovereignty seemed like an excellent way to decide whether slavery would be allowed in the Nebraska Territory. Kansas and Nebraska territory was legally closed to slavery. Douglas introduced a bill on January the 23rd of 1854 that divides the area into two territories. Northern congressman saw the bill as a plot to turn the territories into slave states. Southern congressman defended the proposed legislation. The Kansas-Nebraska Act became law in 1854. -
Bleeding Kansas
Bleeding Kansas is the term used to described the period of violence during the settling of the Kansas territory. The race for Kansas was on. Both supporters and opponents of slavery attempted to populate Kansas in order to win the vote slavery in the territory. Kansas had enough settlers to hold an election for a territory. Thousands of "border ruffians" from the slave state of Missouri crossed into Kansas, voted illegally, and won a fraudulent majority for the proslavery candidates. -
Dred Scott Decision
A major Supreme Court decision was brought by Dred Scott, a slave whose owner took him from the slave state of Missouri into a free territory in Illinois & Wisconsin and back to Missouri. He then appealed to the Supreme Court for freedom on the grounds that living in a free state had made him a free man. This case was in court for years. And finally, on March 6, 1857, the Supreme Court ruled against Dred Scott. Scott couldn't sue in court because he was not, and never could be, a citizen. -
Lincoln is Elected President
As the 1860 presidential election approached, the republicans nominated Abraham Lincoln to be President. Although he pledged to abolish slavery, he also tried to reassure Southerners that a Republican administrator would not "interfere with their slaves, or with them, about their slaves." Southerners viewed him as an enemy. Lincoln emerged as the winner with less than half the popular vote and with no electoral votes from the South. He did not even appear on the ballot in most of the states. -
Battle of Bull Run
On July 21, 1861, Union and Confederate armies clashed near Manassas Junction, Virginia, in the first major land battle of the American Civil War. It began when about 35,000 Union troops marched from the federal capital in Washington, D.C. to strike a Confederate force of 20,000 along the river known as Bull Run. The Confederate victory gave the South a surge of confidence and shocked many in the North, who realized the war would not be won as easily as they had hoped. -
Battle of Antietam
On September 17, 1862, Generals Robert E. Lee and George McClellan faced off near Antietam creek in Sharpsburg, Maryland, in the first battle of the American Civil War to be fought on northern soil. Though the result of the battle was inconclusive, it remains the bloodiest single day in American history, with more than 22,000 casualties. -
Emancipation Proclamation
Although Lincoln did not like slavery, he didn't believe that the federal government had the power to abolish it where it already existed. As the war continued, Lincoln found a way to use his war powers to end slavery. Lincoln's powers as commander in chief allowed him to order his troops to seize enemy resources. He decided that, just as he could order the Union army to take Confederate supplies, he could authorize the army to emancipate slavery. Lincoln issued Emancipation Proclamation. -
Battle of Gettysburg
The most decisive battle of the war. The Battle of Gettysburg began on July 1 when Confederate soldiers encountered several brigades of Union cavalry. On July 2, Lee ordered General James Longstreet to attack Cemetery Ridge. On July 3, Lee ordered an artillery barrage on the center of the Union lines on Cemetery Ridge. The 3 day battle produced losses: 23,000 Union men & 28,000 Confederates were killed or wounded. Total casualties were more than 30 percent. -
Battle of Vicksburg
Was also called the Siege of Vicksburg, was the culmination of a long land and naval campaign by Union forces to capture a key strategic position during the American Civil War. President Abraham Lincoln recognized the significance of the town. He said, "Vicksburg is the key, the war can never be brought to a close until that key is in our pocket." It was a Union victory. -
Sherman's March
Sherman began his march southeast through Georgia to the sea, creating a wide path of destruction. His army burned almost every house in its path and destroyed livestock and railroads. Sherman was determined to make Southerners "so sick of war that generations would pass away before they would again appeal to it." After reaching the ocean, Sherman's forces followed by 25,000 former slaves turned north to help Grant "wipe out Lee." -
Lincoln is Assassinated
On April 14, 1865, Lincoln and his wife went to Ford's Theatre in Washington to see a British comedy, Our American Cousin. During the third act, a man crept up behind Lincoln and shot the him in the back of his head. Lincoln, died on April 15. He was the very first president to be assassinated. After the shooting, the assassin, John Wilkes Booth, a 26 year old actor then leaped down from the box to the stage and escaped. Twelve days later, shot & killed Booth. -
Battle of Appomattox Court
On April 9, 1865, near the town of Appomattox Court House, Virginia, Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrendered his Army of Northern Virginia to Union General Ulysses S. Grant. Lee goal was to rally the remnants of his beleaguered troops, meet Confederate reinforcements in North Carolina and resume fighting. But the resulting Battle of Appomattox Court House, which lasted only a few hours, effectively brought the four-year Civil War to an end. -
KKK (Ku Klux Klan)
The most notorious vigilante groups was founded in 1866, the Ku Klux Klan (KKK) extended in almost every southern state by 1870 and became a vehicle for white southern resistance to the Republican Party’s Reconstruction-era policies aimed at establishing political and economic equality for blacks. After a period, white protestors groups revived the Klan in the early 20th century, burning crosses and staging rallies, parades and marches denouncing immigrants, Catholics, Jews, & blacks. -
Grant Elected
In the 1868 presidential election, the Civil War hero Ulysses S. Grant won by a margin of only 306,000 votes out of almost 6 million ballots cast. More than 500,000 Southern African Americans had voted. The importance of the African American vote to the Republican Party was obvious. After the election, the Radicals introduced the Fifteenth Amendment, states that no one can be kept from voting because of "race, color, or previous condition of servitude."
