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1846
Wilmot Proviso attempts to ban slavery in the West
1848
Mexican War ends
Free-Soil Party forms
Zachary Taylor elected president
1849
California and Utah request admittance to the Union
1850
Compromise of 1850
Congress passes Fugitive Slave Act
Zachary Taylor dies; Millard Fillmore becomes president
1852
Harriet Beecher Stowe publishes Uncle Tom’s Cabin
Franklin Pierce elected president
1853
Gadsden Purchase negotiated
1854
Ostend Manifesto exposed
Congress passes Kansas-Nebraska Act
Republican Party forms
1855
William Walker invades Nicaragua
1856
Border ruffians burn the town of Lawrence, Kansas
Pottawatomie Massacre
Charles Sumner attacked in the Senate
James Buchanan elected president
1857
Supreme Court issues Dred Scott v. Sanford decision
Buchanan accepts Lecompton Constitution
Panic of 1857
1858
Congress rejects Lecompton Constitution
Abraham Lincoln and Stephen Douglas debate slavery in Illinois
1859
John Brown raids Harpers Ferry, Virginia
1860
Abraham Lincoln elected president
South Carolina secedes from the Union
1861
Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Texas secede
Jefferson Davis becomes president of the Confederate States of America
Lincoln delivers first inaugural address
South Carolina seizes Fort Sumter
Arkansas, North Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia secede
Congress passes Morrill Tariff
Lincoln suspends writ of habeas corpus
Trent Affair occurs
Confederacy defeats Union at First Battle of Bull Run
1862
Congress passes Legal Tender Act, Homestead Act, and Morrill Land Grant Act
Confederacy passes Conscription Act
U.S. Congress passes Confiscation Act
Union defeats Confederacy at Shiloh and Antietam
1863
Congress passes National Banking Act
Drafts initiated in the North
Draft riots in New York City
France invades Mexico
Bread riots in Richmond, Virginia
Lincoln issues Emancipation Proclamation
Union defeats Confederacy at Gettysburg and Vicksburg
Lincoln delivers Gettysburg Address
1864
Ulysses S. Grant takes command of Union troops
Lincoln is reelected
General Sherman begins March to the Sea
1865
Davis proposes Hampton Roads peace conference
Robert E. Lee surrenders to Grant at Appomattox Courthouse
