• Course Description

• Course Information

• Outline

• Tutorial Readings

• Further Readings

• Assessment & Assignments

• Timeline

• Lecture Outlines (in Word)

• Web Links

English settlers begin to found colonies in North America in the first two decades of the 17 th century. By the time of the American Revolution there are 13 colonies along the Atlantic coast.  Click here for a map of the original colonies.
For a brief history of the original 13 colonies, including the colonists' backgrounds, colonizing methods and agendas (which will help to give you a better understand of the remarkably different histories of North America's various regions), click here:  

The first African slaves were brought to Jamestown in 1619 to harvest tobacco along with indentured whites. Initially there were no legal provisions that separated black slaves and white indentured servants. But by the end of the 1600s, permanent legal distinctions based on race had been introduced to all slave-holding states.

Population in the colonies has increased by 300% to over 1 million; transatlantic crossings have tripled; dramatic growth in urban centres and places of urban sociability in the colonies.

Northern states began to gradually abolish slavery, a process that was complete by the late 1820s.

The cotton gin is invented, making it possible to profitably grow cotton in the southwest, eventually leading to a dramatic expansion of slavery.

For the next 8 years Thomas Jefferson is president (often called the Jeffersonian Era)

Beginning of the market revolution, particularly in the Northeast. By the second decade of the nineteenth century, mills and factories have begun to operate in Massachusetts, New York and other Northeastern areas. A transportation revolution has swept the nation and by the 1850s there has been a huge expansion of railroads. The mechanization of farming has begun, esp. in the Northwest.

Slave owners expand into the Southwest, beginning one the largest forced migrations in world history. Millions of slaves are forcibly removed from the southeast into the southwest.

Missouri Compromise: The previous year, Congress began to debate the admission of Missouri into the Union as a state. This led to the problem of whether slavery would be restricted in Missouri as a condition of admission. At this time there were an equal number of slave states and free states in the Union. The admission of Missouri would upset the balance of power in the Senate. A compromise was reached which temporarily avoided crisis by admitting Missouri as a slave state and admitting Maine (then a territory) as a free state. This compromise included the provision that slavery would not be allowed in the Louisiana Territory north of the 36° 30' parallel. As the nation spread westward, however, this question would inevitably arise again.

These were decades of great religious ferment and experimentation. The Second Great Awakening (a further series of religious revivals) spread during this period, generating hundreds of reform movements such as temperance, abolitionism and women's rights.

Nat Turner slave rebellion in Virginia: 70 slaves kill 60 whites in 2 days.
William Lloyd garrison founds The Liberator , a weekly abolitionist newspaper in Boston.

British abolish slavery in their Caribbean colonies.
Whig Party organized.

Tightening of black codes completed by southern legislatures.

Congress passes "gag rule" to prevent discussion of antislavery petitions.
James Henry Hammond announces to Congress that slavery is a positive benefit for slaves.

Beginning of Irish Potato Famine and mass Irish Catholic immigration into the United States.

Mexican-American War begins.
Pennsylvania Congressman David Wilmot touches off a massively divisive debate in Congress when he introduces a motion stating that slavery should be prohibited in any territory acquired from Mexico. His measure passed in the House (which was dominated by non-slave holding states) but failed to pass in the southern-dominated Senate. This led to bitter debate over the issue of slavery in the territories, becoming a plank in the platforms of the Free-Soil and Republican Parties.

First Women's Rights Convention held at Seneca Falls, NY.
Free Soil Party captures 10 percent of the popular vote in the North. [see the note below on Political Parties].

California Gold Rush begins.
California and Utah seek admission to the Union as free states.

Compromise of 1850: California admitted as free state; Texas (already admitted in 1845) is a slave state; the rest of the lands ceded by Mexico to be decided by popular sovereignty. Ends the slave trade in the District of Columbia, but a stronger Fugitive Slave Law, leading to a number of violent recaptures which arouse northern antislavery opinion.
American (Know Nothing) Party formed.
Zachary Taylor dies, Millard Fillmore becomes president.

North reacts to Fugitive Slave Law
Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin published.

Franklin Pierce elected president.

Kansas-Nebraska Act. At the urging of Stephen A. Douglas, Congress opens Kansas and Nebraska Territories for settlement under popular sovereignty. Open warfare between proslavery and antislavery factions breaks out in Kansas.
Whig Party dissolves and Republican Party is formed.

Burning and looting of Lawrence, Kansas. John Brown leads Pottawatomie massacre
Attack on Senator Charles Sumner.
James Buchanan elected president.

Dred Scott decision. This was a legal case brought before the Supreme Court in which a slave (Dred Scott) attempted to sue for his freedom on the basis that his owner had taken him to live in a free state. In an infamous decision, the Supreme Court declared that all people of African ancestry (slave as well as free) could never be citizens of the U.S. and could not sue in federal court. Further, the Court asserted that the federal government did not have the power to prohibit slavery in its territories. This decision effectively nullified the Missouri Compromise. It was widely interpreted in the North as an indication that slavery would spread northward.
Hinton Helper publishes The Impending Crisis , an attack on slavery.
Lecompton Constitution. President Buchanan accepts proslavery Lecompton constitution in Kansas.
Panic of 1857.

Congress rejects Lecompton constitution.
Lincoln-Douglas debates.

Democratic Party Nominating Conventions: The Democrats are unable to agree on a candidate; two candidates, one northern (Stephen A. Douglas) and one southern (John C. Breckinridge) split the party and the vote, thus allowing Republican Abraham Lincoln to win.
Four parties run presidential candidates: Lincoln is elected president.
South Carolina secedes from the Union.