Timeline of events leading to the American Civil War

This timeline of events leading to the American Civil War is a chronologically ordered list of events and issues that historians recognize as origins and causes of the American Civil War. These events are roughly divided into two periods: the first encompasses the gradual build-up over many decades of the numerous social, economic, and political issues that ultimately contributed to the war's outbreak, and the second encompasses the five-month span following the election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States in 1860 and culminating in the capture of Fort Sumter in April 1861.

Scholars have identified many different causes for the war, but the most polarizing issue was whether the institution of slavery should be retained and even expanded to other territories or whether it should be contained, which would lead to its ultimate extinction. Since the early colonial period, slavery had played a major role in the socioeconomic system of British America and was widespread in the Thirteen Colonies at the time of the American Declaration of Independence in 1776. During and after the American Revolution, events and statements by politicians and others brought forth differences, tensions and divisions between citizens of the slave states of the Southern United States and citizens of the free states of the Northern United States (including several newly admitted Western states) over the topics of slavery. In the many decades between the Revolutionary War and the Civil War, such divisions became increasingly irreconcilable and contentious.James M. McPherson, Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era (1988), ch. 1–8.

Events in the 1850s culminated with the election of the anti-slavery Republican Abraham Lincoln as president on November 6, 1860. This provoked the first round of state secession as leaders of the cotton states of the Deep South were unwilling to remain in what they perceived as a second-class political status, with their way of life now threatened by the President himself. Initially, seven states seceded: Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, South Carolina and Texas. After the Confederates attacked and captured Fort Sumter, President Lincoln called for volunteers to march south and suppress the rebellion. This pushed four other states in the Upper South (Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee and Arkansas) also to secede, completing the incorporation of the Confederate States of America by July 1861. Their contributions of territory and soldiers to the Confederacy ensured, in retrospect, that the war would be prolonged and bloody.

Colonial period, 1607–1775

1619 A Dutch ship arrives in the Virginia Colony carrying about twenty black Africans as indentured servants. From this beginning, African slavery is introduced to the future United States.Bowman, John S., ed. The Civil War Almanac. New York: Facts on File, Bison Book Corp., 1982. . Chronology: The Approach to War (pp. 12–50) and Chronology: The War Years (pp. 50–269), p. 12.Rubin, Louis, D. Virginia, a History. New York, W. W. Norton & Company, Inc, 1977. . p. 9Wilson, Henry. History of the Rise and Fall of the Slave Power in America. 3 volumes. Volume 1. Boston: James R. Osgood and Company, 1872. . Retrieved April 13, 2011. pp. 2–31640 The General Court of Virginia orders John Punch, a runaway black servant, to "serve his master or his assigns for the time of his natural Life here or elsewhere." Thus, "John Punch, a black man, was sentenced to [a] lifetime [of] slavery."McCartney, Martha W. A Study of Africans and African Americans on Jamestown Island and at Green Spring, 1619–1803 (Colonial Williamsburg Foundation, 2003), p. 47.1652 After earlier laws in the Massachusetts Bay Colony (1641) and Connecticut Colony (1650) limit slavery to some extent, a 1652 law in the Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations clearly limits bond service to no more than 10 years or no later than a person attaining the age of 24.Wilson, 1872, p. 6. Nevertheless, Newport becomes a large slave trade center a century later.William McLoughlin, Rhode Island, a history (1986), p. 106 online.1654 John Casor of Northampton County is the first Virginian to be judicially confirmed as a slave for life other than for violation of the law.Warren Billings,The Old Dominion in the Seventeenth Century: A Documentary History of Virginia, 1606–1700 (2007), pp. 237–338.Russell, John Henderson. The free Negro in Virginia, 1619–1865 (1913).1671 About 2,000 of the 40,000 inhabitants of colonial Virginia are imported slaves. White indentured servants working for five years before their release are three times as numerous and provide much of the hard labor.William O. Blake, History of Slavery and the Slave Trade, Ancient and Modern (1861), p. 372.1712 A slave insurrection in New York City causes significant property damage and results in severe punishment or execution of the rebels.Ferenc M. Szasz, "The New York Slave Revolt of 1741: A Re-Examination." New York History (1967): 215–230 in JSTOR.1719 Non-slaveholding farmers in Virginia persuade the Virginia General Assembly to discuss a prohibition of slavery or a ban on importing slaves. In response, the assembly raises the tariff on slaves to five pounds, which about equals the full price of an indenture, so as not to make importation of slaves as initially attractive or preferable to a mere indenture for a term of years.Dowdey, 1969, p. 274.1739 In South Carolina, the Stono Rebellion becomes the largest slave uprising yet in the Thirteen Colonies, with 25 white people and 35 to 50 black people killed.1741 Another insurrection of slaves in New York City causes significant property damage; slaves are severely punished or executed.Thomas J. Davis, "The New York Slave Conspiracy of 1741 as Black Protest". In Journal of Negro History, Vol. 56, No. 1 (January 1971), pp. 17–30 in JSTOR.1774 Quakers, led by James Pemberton and others including Benjamin Rush and Benjamin Franklin, organize the first abolitionist society in the colonies, the Pennsylvania Society for the Abolition of Slavery, in Philadelphia.Blake, 1861, p. 178.James M. McPherson, Ordeal By Fire: The Civil War and Reconstruction (1982), p. 38 gives the year as 1775.

American Revolution and Confederation period, 1776–1787

1776 The United States Declaration of Independence declares "that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness." Slavery remains legal in the new nation. A clause condemning slavery is included in the Declaration but is removed at the insistence of South Carolina and Georgia.1777 The Republic of Vermont, an independent state at the time, prohibits slavery in its constitution.J. Kevin Graffagnino, "Vermont Attitudes Toward Slavery: The Need for a Closer Look," Vermont History, January 1977, Vol. 45 Issue 1, pp. 31–34.Blake, 1861, pp. 421–422.1778 The Virginia legislature passes a law, with Thomas Jefferson's support and probably authorship, that bans importing slaves into Virginia. It is the first state to ban the slave trade, and all other states eventually follow suit.Historians report "in all likelihood Jefferson composed [the law] although the evidence is not conclusive"; John E. Selby and Don Higginbotham, The Revolution in Virginia, 1775–1783 (2007), p. 158.Blake, 1861, p. 389.1779 John Laurens attempts to convince the Continental Congress to allow slaves to join the Continental Army in return for freedom. The Congress gives him permission to do this, but opposition from the South Carolina legislature prevents it.1780 A gradual emancipation law is adopted in Pennsylvania.Wagner, Margaret E., Gary W. Gallagher, and Paul Finkelman. The Library of Congress Civil War Desk Reference. New York: Simon & Schuster Paperbacks, Inc., 2009 edition. . First published 2002, p. 57.Bowman, 1982, p. 12, states that in 1780–1804, the Northern states passed laws and their courts issued decisions that in effect prohibited slavery in those states.Blake, 1861, p. 406. Massachusetts bans slavery in its constitution.Wilson, 1872, p. 20.1782 Virginia liberalizes its very strict law preventing manumission; under the new law, a master may emancipate slaves in his will or by deed.1783 The New Hampshire Constitution says children will be born free, but some slavery persists until the 1840s.Howard T. Oedel, "Slavery In Colonial Portsmouth," Historical New Hampshire, Autumn 1966, Vol. 21 Issue 3, pp 3–11.1784 Rhode Island and Connecticut pass laws providing for gradual emancipation of slaves.Nicholas Santoro, Atlas of Slavery and Civil Rights (2006), pp. 19–21. The Continental Congress rejects by one vote Jefferson's proposal to prohibit slavery in all territories, including areas that become the states of Alabama, Kentucky, Mississippi and Tennessee.Peter S. Onuf, Congress and the Confederation (1991), p. 345.1786 George Washington writes: "There is not a man living who wishes more sincerely than I do, to see a plan adopted for the abolition of it [slavery]."Frank E. Grizzard Jr., George! a Guide to All Things Washington (2005), p. 285. Civil War era historian William Blake says these "sentiments were confined to a few liberal and enlightened men."1787 July 13: Under the Articles of Confederation, the Continental Congress passes the Northwest Ordinance to govern the frontier territory north of the Ohio River and west of Pennsylvania, which includes the future states of Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, Wisconsin and Minnesota. In the ordinance, Congress prohibits slavery and involuntary servitude in the Northwest Territory and requires the return of fugitive slaves captured in the territory to their owners. The law no longer applies as soon as the territories become states. In the following years, anti-slavery Northerners cite the ordinance many times as precedent for the limitation, if not the abolition, of slavery in the United States. Despite the terms of the ordinance, Southern-born settlers try and fail to pass laws to allow slavery in Indiana and Illinois.Junius P. Rodriguez, ed. The Historical Encyclopedia of World Slavery (1997), 2:473–4.

Early Constitutional period, 1787–1811

1787 The Constitutional Convention drafts the new United States Constitution with many compromises between supporters and opponents of slavery, including the Three-Fifths Compromise, which increases legislative representation in the House of Representatives and Electoral College by counting each slave as three-fifths of a person (Article I, Section 2). Additionally, the passage of any law that would prohibit the importation of slaves is forbidden for 20 years (Article I, Section 9) and the return of slaves who escape to free states is required (Article IV, Section 2).McPherson, 1982, p. 2.1789 August 7: Congress re-adopts the Northwest Ordinance under the Constitution.Hansen, Harry. The Civil War: A History. New York: Bonanza Books, 1961. , pp. 13–14.Wilson, 1872, p. 33.1790 The total U.S. slave population according to the 1790 United States census is 697,681.Long, E. B. The Civil War Day by Day: An Almanac, 1861–1865. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1971. , p. 700.The census data number of slaves in the U.S. in 1790 of 698,000 apparently has been rounded. The number will grow to nearly 4 million by 1860, 3.5 million of whom live in the seceding Southern states.Long, 1971, pp. 701–702.Wagner, 2009, p. 71.Wagner's figure is rounded to 3,954,000.1791 Vermont is admitted to the Union as a free state. Kentucky is admitted to the Union by a joint resolution of Congress before the state has adopted a constitution. Robert Carter III of Virginia gradually begins to free his 452 slaves. He will perform the largest manumission of slaves in U.S. history.Levy, Andrew. The First Emancipator: The Forgotten Story of Robert Carter, the Founding Father who freed his slaves. New York: Random House, 2005. .