Sources: Bowman, John S., ed. The Civil War Almanac; Current, Richard N., et. al., eds. Encyclopedia of the Confederacy. Vols. 1-4; Emanuel, Samuel. A Historical Sketch of the Georgetown Rifle Guards, as Company A of the Tenth Regiment, S.C.V.; Heidler, David S. and Jeanne T. Heidler, eds. Encyclopedia of the American Civil War: A Political, Social, and Military History. Vols. 1-5; McPherson, James M., ed. Battle Chronicles of the Civil War, 1861. Vols. 1-5; Swanson, Mark. Atlas of the Civil War Month by Month: Major Battles and Troop Movements; Wagner, Margaret E., Gary W. Gallagher, and Paul Finkelman, eds. The Library of Congress Civil War Desk Reference.
1820 - 1860
Date | Key Event |
March 1820 | The Missouri Compromise of 1820 When Missouri applies for admittance as slave state, their petition is opposed by several Northerners as technically being north of the Ohio River—the river being the legal dividing line between free territories and slave territories as defined in the Northwest Ordinance of 1787. When Southerners oppose the admittance of Maine as a free state, a compromise is reached where every territory above a line extending west from the southern boundary of Missouri—36°-30’—would be forever free. (Wagner 106) |
November 1832 | Nullification, States’ Rights, and Secession Compromise was again the saver of the day when South Carolina threatened to secede over a tariff they believed was oppressively high. John C. Calhoun of South Carolina introduced a novel legal concept known as nullification—a state was sovereign and could “cancel” federal laws with which it disagreed. As a sovereign state, each state is said to possess superior rights to the federal government and thus could ignore laws or leave the Union at will. When South Carolina threatened to do just that, Andrew Jackson prepared to send a military force to put down what he considered was an insurrection. Before fighting could break out, Congress adopted a compromise tariff that defused the issue—for the immediate future. (American Economy) |
May 1836 | The Gag Rule The House of Representatives adopts a “gag rule” that prohibits the introduction of any bill that touches upon the issue of slavery. Despite yearly attempts to repeal the rule, it will remain in force until 1844. (Bowman 16) |
November 1844 | James K. Polk Elected President James K. Polk is elected president and promptly confronts Great Britain over Oregon and Mexico over Texas. (Polk 1848) |
May 1846 – February 1848 | The War with Mexico Many future Civil War commanders, from Robert E. Lee to Ulysses S. Grant, serve in the U.S. Army and experience combat for the first time. Grant would later call the war with Mexico unjust. (Grant 1:53) |
August 1846 | The Wilmot Proviso Despite reassurances that the United States was not seeking new territories for the expansion of slavery, Representative David Wilmot of Pennsylvania introduces a bill that, like the Northwest Ordinance written by Thomas Jefferson in 1787, would ban slavery in any new territory acquired from Mexico. The House passes the bill but it does not make it out of the Senate. President Polk makes no effort to support the bill. He also makes to effort to legalize slavery in the territories believing it cannot survive outside of the Deep South. (Polk 2:75; Wilmot 352) |
February 1848 | Manifest Destiny The war with Mexico ends with the signing of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. President Polk’s war increases the size of the United States by a third while reducing Mexico by one-half. Polk’s vision of a United States that extends unbroken from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean—Manifest Destiny—is realized. Remaining unsettled is the issue of slavery in the territories. (Polk, 1848) |
October 1849 | California California asks to be admitted to the Union as a free state. Once again, Southern states threaten secession. President Zachary Taylor—himself a slave owner—tells the South that he will personally lead the army that would quash their insurrection. (Bowman 35) |
February – September 1850 | Compromise, Compromise, Compromise The three great Senate stalwarts of compromise on the issue of the expansion of slavery into the territories—Henry Clay of Kentucky, John Calhoun of South Carolina, and Daniel Webster of Massachusetts—use their eloquent oratory one last time (they will all be succumb to age with 2 years) to prevent the Union from fracturing over the issue of admitting California as a free state. (Wagner 109-111) |
September 1850 | Compromise of 1850 Congress votes on the Compromise of 1850. Rather than being one “omnibus” bill as envisioned by its author, Henry Clay, it is split into five separate bills to allow Members of Congress political cover as the issue of the expansion of slavery into the territories becomes more fractious. Those Senators who favor continued compromise fall into disfavor while extremist on both sides of the slavery issue flourish. (Wagner 110) Despite the increasingly heated debates on the subject of slavery, it has been on its expansion into the territories, not on its existence in the South that has created the conflicts to date. In the six decades since the founding of the nation, not one bill pertaining to the abolition of slavery in the South has ever been introduced or debated on the floor of Congress. |
March 1852 | The Little Woman Who Caused. . . Harriet Beecher Stowe publishes Uncle Tom’s Cabin. The debate over the total abolition of slavery begins in earnest throughout the nation. (Wagner 110-111) |
January 1854 | The Transcontinental Railroad The debate over the placement of a transcontinental railroad pits North against South as Senator Stephen A. Douglas of Illinois champions a Great Plains route while Senator Jefferson Davis of Mississippi favors a route through the South. Douglas proposes a compromise that would allow the future residents of Nebraska and Kansas—territories north of the Missouri Compromise line—to vote on slavery, the belief being one would choose slavery and the other would ban it. (Wagner) |
May 1854 | The Kansas-Nebraska Act Congress passes the Kansas-Nebraska Act despite its virtual repeal of the tenuous Compromise of 1850—specifically the prohibition of slavery north of the 36-30 line. Northern states threaten to stop enforcement of another provision of the Compromise of 1850 in retaliation—the toughened Fugitive Slave Act. (Bowman) |
October 1855 | Popular Sovereignty Pro- and anti-slavery factions are increasingly drawn into armed conflicts as violence erupts in Bleeding Kansas. The concept of “popular sovereignty” in which the residents of a territory would peacefully decide for themselves the issue of slavery turns out to be a fallacy. (Bowman) |
May 1856 | Charles Sumner Incident Senator Charles Sumner of Massachusetts is severely beaten by a cane-wielding Member of the House, Representative Preston Brooks of South Carolina. Brooks objected to Sumner’s speech condemning the position of Southern senators over the tariff and state’s rights.* (Bowman) |
March 1857 | The Dred Scott Case The Supreme Court in the Scott v. Sandford rules that a black man “had no rights which the white man was bound to respect.” The ruling also finds the Missouri Compromise unconstitutional and that slave owners may take their property anywhere, as Congress has not the authority to interfere with slavery. It is with this ruling that Chief Justice Roger B. Tawny believes the issue of slavery in the United States has been resolved once and for all since Congress can no longer debate the issue short of an amendment to the Constitution. (Wagner 114-16) |
August 1858 | Lincoln-Douglas Debates Republican Abraham Lincoln squares off against incumbent Democrat Stephen Douglas for the Illinois’ U.S. Senate seat. Douglas, in a bid to keep the Democratic Party from breaking into Northern and Southern factions, adopts a right to choose position over the issue of slavery while Lincoln comes out in opposition to it. While Lincoln looses the race to Douglas, his conduct gains him a national following. (Bowman 39) |
May 1859 | African Slave Trade Revisted To promote economic growth in the South, a Southern trade organization proposes the reestablishment of the African slave trade. (Bowman 39) Historical Sketches Citizens of Georgetown, South Carolina, organize the Georgetown Rifle Guards, a volunteer infantry company to provide a militia for Georgetown. Residents voice concerns about the “disturbed conditions” between the North and the South. This unit would later form the core of Company A, Tenth South Carolina Volunteer Infantry. (Emanuel 5) |
October 1859 | John Brown John Brown seizes the Federal armory at Harper’s Ferry, Virginia. He captured by a Federal force led by Major Robert E. Lee. (Bowman 39-40) |
May 1860 | Republicans Nominate Abraham Lincoln Republicans meeting in Chicago nominate Abraham Lincoln to be their candidate for president. They adopt a moderate platform calling for the prohibition of slavery in the territories but not its abolition. Lincoln endorses and supports the policy. (Bowman 40) |
*Seriously, the beating of Charles Sumner had nothing to do with tariffs or states’ rights; it was about the expansion of slavery into the territories. |
