| 1812 |
- Louisiana is admitted as a slave state.
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| 1814 |
- The Hartford Convention of delegates from Massachusetts, Connecticut and Rhode Island and unofficial delegates from New Hampshire and Vermont meets between December 15, 1814 and January 4, 1815. The delegates discuss New England's opposition to the War of 1812 and trade embargoes. The convention report says that New England had a "duty" to assert its authority over unconstitutional infringements on its sovereignty, a position similar to the later nullification theory put forward by South Carolina. The war soon ends and the convention and the Federalist Party which had supported it fall out of favor, especially in the South although leaders in Southern states later would adopt the States' rights concept for their own purposes.
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| 1816 |
- Henry Clay, James Monroe, Bushrod Washington, Robert Finley, Samuel John Mills Jr. and others organize the American Colonization Society to send freed slaves to Liberia. The Society funds the migration of about 10,000 free blacks to return to Africa.
- In Philadelphia, the African Methodist Episcopal Church, the first black denomination in the United States, is established by Richard Allen.
- Indiana joins the United States as a free state.
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| 1817 |
- Mississippi, a slave state, is admitted the union.
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| 1818 |
- Illinois joins the union as a free state.
- Missouri petitions Congress for admission to the union as a slave state. Missouri's possible admission as a slave state threatens the balance of 11 free states and 11 slave states. Three years of debate ensues.
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| 1819 |
- Alabama, a slave state, enters the union.
- Missouri again petitions for admission to the union.
- U. S. Representative James Tallmadge, Jr. of New York submits an amendment to the legislation for the admission of Missouri which would prohibit further introduction of slaves into Missouri. The proposal also would free all children of slave parents in Missouri when they reached the age of twenty-five. The measure passes in the House of Representatives but is defeated in the Senate.
- Representative Thomas W. Cobb of Georgia threatens disunion if Tallmadge persists in attempting to have his amendment enacted.
- Southern Senators delay a bill to admit Maine as a free state in response to the delay of Missouri's admission to the union as a slave state.
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| 1820 |
- U.S. slave population in the 1820 United States Census: 1,538,000.
- Speaker of the House Henry Clay of Kentucky proposes the Missouri Compromise to break the Congressional deadlock over Missouri's admission to the union. Missouri would be admitted to the Union as a slave state (which it was on August 10, 1821) and the northern counties of Massachusetts would be admitted as a free state, the State of Maine (which occurred on March 15, 1820). To the west, slavery would be prohibited north of 36°30' of latitude, which was approximately the southern boundary of Missouri. Many Southerners argued against exclusion of slavery from such a large area of the country. The restriction of slavery north of the 36° 30' line of latitude will be abrogated by the popular sovereignty voting provision of the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854.
- The African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church is founded in New York City.
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| 1821 |
- After Missouri becomes a state, its legislature passes a law excluding free blacks and mulattoes from the State in violation of a Congressional condition to its admission to the Union.
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| 1822 |
- The Vesey Plot causes fear among whites in South Carolina, who are convinced that Denmark Vesey and other slaves plan a violent slave uprising in the Charleston area. The plan is discovered and Vesey and thirty-four of his presumed followers are seized and hanged.
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| 1824 |
- Congregationalist minister Charles Grandison Finney, a leader of the religious revivals known as the Second Great Awakening, includes abolitionism among the social reforms inspired by the Awakening in the Northeast and Midwest.
- Congress passes a high protective tariff law which many angry Southerners view as a corrupt aid to the North. South Carolina College (University of South Carolina) President Thomas Cooper questions the value of the Union to the Southern states.
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| 1826 |
- New Jersey, followed by Pennsylvania, pass the first personal liberty laws, which require a judicial hearing before an alleged fugitive slave can be removed from the state.
- Thomas Cooper of South Carolina publishes On the Constitution, an early essay in favor of states' rights.
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| 1827 |
- The process of gradual emancipation is completed in New York state and the last slave is freed.
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| 1828 |
- Congress passes the Tariff of 1828. It also is called the "Tariff of Abominations" by its opponents, mainly Southerners and some New Englanders.
- The opposition of Southern cotton planters to transfer of federal funds in one state to another state for internal improvements and to protective tariffs to aid small Northern industries compete with foreign goods leads a South Carolina legislative committee to issue a report entitled South Carolina Exposition and Protest. The report outlines the nullification doctrine. The doctrine would reserve to a state the right to nullify an act of Congress that injures perceived reserved state rights as unconstitutional. The state could prevent the law's enforcement within its borders. James Madison of Virginia, fourth President of the United States and a framer of the U.S. Constitution, called the doctrine a "preposterous and anarchical pretension." The report threatens secession of the State over high tariff taxes. In 1831, Vice President and later U.S. Senator from South Carolina John C. Calhoun admits he was the author of the previously unsigned South Carolina committee report.
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| 1829 |
- David Walker, a freed slave from North Carolina living in Boston, publishes Appeal to the Colored Citizens of the World. He calls on slaves to revolt and destroy slavery. Walker dies the following year amid reportedly questionable circumstances.
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| 1830 |
- U.S. slave population in the 1830 United States Census: 2,009,043.
- In North Carolina v. Mann, the Supreme Court of North Carolina ruled that slaveowners had absolute authority over their slaves and could not be found guilty of committing violence against them.
- Daniel Webster delivers a speech entitled Reply to Hayne. Webster condemns the proposition expressed by Senator Robert Y. Hayne of South Carolina that Americans must choose between liberty and union. Webster closed: "Liberty and Union, now and forever, one and inseparable!"
- The National Negro Convention, a black abolitionist and civil rights organization, is founded.
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| 1831 |
- Abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison begins publishing The Liberator, a greatly influential publication. About this time, abolitionism takes a radical and religious turn. Many abolitionists begin to demand immediate emancipation of slaves.
- Nat Turner leads a slave revolt in Southampton County, Virginia in August. At least 58 white persons are killed. Whites in turn kill about 100 blacks in the area during the search for Turner and his companions and in retaliation for their actions. Turner hides but is captured several months later. Turner and 12 followers are executed. Turner's actions outrage Southerners and some suspect abolitionists supported him. They prepare for further uprisings.
- Southern defenders of slavery start describing it as a "positive good," not just a "necessary evil."
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| 1832 |
- Congress enacts a new protective tariff, the Tariff of 1832, which offers South Carolina and the South little relief and provokes new controversy between the sections of the country.
- John C. Calhoun further explains the nullification doctrine in an open letter to South Carolina Governor James Hamilton, Jr. Calhoun says that the Constitution only raised the federal government to the level of the state, not above it. He argues that nullification is not secession and did not require secession to be put into effect.
- Thomas R. Dew writes Review of the Debate in the Virginia Legislature of 1831 and 1832, a strong defense of slavery and attack on colonization in Africa by freed slaves.
- On November 19, 1832, South Carolina calls a state convention, which passes an Ordinance of Nullification with an effective date of February 1, 1833. The convention declares the tariff void because it threatens the state's essential interests. The South Carolina legislature acts to enforce the ordinance.
- President Andrew Jackson, a Southerner and slave owner, calls nullification "rebellious treason" and threatens to use force against possible secessionist action in South Carolina caused by the Nullification Crisis. Congress passes the "Force Bill" which permits the President to use the Army and Navy to enforce the law. Jackson also urges Congress to modify the tariff, which they soon do.
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| 1833 |
- The Compromise Tariff of 1833 proposed by Henry Clay ends the Nullification crisis by lowering some rates. Under the Force Bill, which is also enacted, the President could use the army and navy to enforce federal laws. No other states supported South Carolina's argument and position and after Clay's compromise legislation passes, South Carolina withdrew its resolution.
- The abolitionist American Anti-Slavery Society is founded in Philadelphia. The movement soon splits into five factions that do not always agree but which continue to advocate abolition in their own ways.
- Abolitionist Lydia Maria Child of Massachusetts publishes An Appeal in Favor of That Class of Americans Called Africans. Wendell Phillips and Charles Sumner are persuaded to become abolitionists.
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| 1834 |
- Anti-Slavery "debates" are held at Lane Theological Seminary in Cincinnati, Ohio. Lane had been founded by abolitionist evangelist and writer Theodore Dwight Weld with financial help from abolitionist merchants and philanthropists Arthur Tappan and Lewis Tappan.
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| 1835 |
- A Georgia law prescribes the death penalty for publication of material with the intention of provoking a slave rebellion.
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| 1836 |
- The U.S. House of Representatives passes the Pinckney Resolutions on May 26, 1836. The first two resolutions state that Congress has no constitutional authority to interfere with slavery in the states and that it "ought not" to do so in the District of Columbia. The third resolution, from the outset known as the "gag rule", says: "All petitions, memorials, resolutions, propositions, or papers, relating in any way, or to any extent whatsoever, to the subject of slavery or the abolition of slavery, shall, without being either printed or referred, be laid on the table and that no further action whatever shall be had thereon." Massachusetts representative and former President John Quincy Adams leads an eight-year battle against the gag rule. He argues that the Slave Power, as a political interest, threatened constitutional rights.
- Texas successfully declares its independence from Mexico.
- Arkansas, a slave state, is admitted to the Union.
- Committed abolitionists Angelina Grimké Weld and her sister Sarah Grimké were born in Charleston, South Carolina, but move to Philadelphia because of their anti-slavery philosophy and Quaker faith. In 1836, Angelina publishes An Appeal to the Christian Women of the South, inviting them to overthrow slavery, which she declares is a horrible system of oppression and cruelty.
- Democratic Party nominee Martin Van Buren, a New Yorker with Southern sympathies, won the Presidential election.
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| 1837 |
- In Alton, Illinois, a mob kills abolitionist and anti-Catholic editor Elijah P. Lovejoy, whose paper angered Southerners and Irish Catholics.
- Michigan, a free state, joins the United States.
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| 1838 |
- Kentucky Congressman William Graves kills Maine Congressman Jonathan Ciley in a duel.
- Anti-slavery societies claim to have 250,000 members.
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| 1839 |
- Slaves revolt on the Spanish ship Amistad; ship winds up in U.S. After a highly publicized Supreme Court case argued by John Quincy Adams, the slaves are freed in March 1841; most return to Africa.
- Northern abolitionist Reverend Theodore Dwight Weld condemns slavery in American Slavery As It Is. He makes his argument by quoting slave owners' words as used in southern newspaper advertisements and articles.
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| 1840 |
- U.S. slave population in the 1840 United States Census: 2,487,000.
- The abolitionist Liberty Party nominates James G. Birney of Kentucky for President.
- Arthur Tappan and Lewis Tappan organize the American and Foreign Anti-Slavery Society.
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| 1841 |
- The last slave (lifetime indentured servant) in New York is freed.
- Slaves being moved from Virginia to Louisiana seize the brig Creole and land in the Bahamas, a British colony that does not allow slavery. The British give asylum to 111 slaves (but not the 19 ringleaders accused of murder). The U.S. government protests and in 1855 the British paid $119,000 to the original owners of the slaves.
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| 1842 |
- In Prigg v. Pennsylvania, the Supreme Court declares the Pennsylvania personal liberty law unconstitutional as in conflict with federal fugitive slave law. The Court holds that enforcement of the fugitive slave law is the responsibility of the federal government.
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| 1843 |
- Massachusetts and eight other states pass personal liberty laws under which state officials are forbidden to assist in the capture of fugitive slaves.
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| 1844 |
- The Methodist Episcopal Church, South breaks away from the Methodist Episcopal Church on the issue of slavery.
- Well-known black abolitionist, Charles Lenox Remond, and famous white abolitionist, William Lloyd Garrison, declare they would rather see the union dissolved than keep the Constitution only through the retention of slavery.
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| 1845 |
- Florida, a slave state, is admitted to the United States.
- The Southern Baptist Convention breaks from the Northern Baptists but does not formally endorse slavery.
- Frederick Douglass publishes his first autobiography, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave, Written by Himself. The book details his life as a slave.
- Former U.S. Representative and Governor of South Carolina, and future U.S. Senator, James Hammond writes Two Letters on Slavery in the United States, Addressed to Thomas Clarkson, Esq. in which he expresses the view that slavery is a positive good.
- Anti-slavery advocates denounce Texas Annexation as evil expansion of slave territory. Whigs defeat an annexation treaty but Congress annexes Texas to the United States as a slave state by a majority vote of both Houses of Congress on a joint resolution without ratification of a treaty by a two-thirds vote in the U.S. Senate.
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| 1846 |
- The Walker Tariff reduction leads to a period of free trade until 1860. Republicans (and Pennsylvania Democrats) attack the low level of the tariff rates.
- James D.B. DeBow establishes DeBow's Review, the leading Southern magazine, which becomes an ardent advocate of secession. DeBow warns against depending on the North economically.
- The Mexican–American War begins. The administration of President James K. Polk had deployed the Army to disputed Texas territory and Mexican forces attacked it. Whigs denounce the war. Antislavery critics charge the war is a pretext for gaining more slave territory. The U.S. Army quickly captures New Mexico.
- Northern representatives in the U.S. House of Representatives pass the Wilmot Proviso which would prevent slavery in territory captured from Mexico. Southern Senators block passage of the proviso into law in the U. S. Senate. The Wilmot Proviso never becomes law but it does substantially increase friction between the North and South. Congress also rejects a proposal to extend the Missouri Compromise line to the west coast and other compromise proposals.
- Iowa is admitted to the United States as a free state.
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| 1847 |
- The Massachusetts legislature resolves that the "unconstitutional" Mexican-American War was being waged for "the triple object of extending slavery, of strengthening the slave power, and of obtaining control of the free states."
- John C. Calhoun asserts that slavery is legal in all of the territories, foreshadowing the U.S. Supreme Court's Dred Scott decision in 1857.
- Democrat Lewis Cass of Michigan proposes letting the people of a territory vote on whether to permit slavery in the territory. This theory of popular sovereignty would be further endorsed and advocated by Democratic Senator Stephen A. Douglas of Illinois in the mid-1850s.
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| 1848 |
- The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo confirms the Texas border with Mexico and U.S. possession of California and the New Mexico territory. The U.S. Senate rejects attempts to attach the Wilmot Proviso during the ratification vote on the treaty.
- Radical New York Democrats and anti-slavery Whigs form the Free-Soil party. The party names former President Martin Van Buren as its presidential candidate and demands enactment of the Wilmot Proviso. The party argues that rich planters will squeeze out small white farmers and buy their land. The Whig Party candidate, General Zachary Taylor, who was born in Virginia, grew up in Kentucky, lived in Louisiana and was the last U.S. President to own slaves, wins the United States Presidential Election of 1848. Taylor expresses no view on slavery in the Southwest during campaign. After the election, he reveals a plan to admit California and New Mexico to the Union as free states covering entire Southwest and to exclude slavery from any territories. Taylor warns the South that he will meet rebellion with force. His moderate views on the expansion of slavery and the acceptability of the Wilmot Proviso angered his unsuspecting Southern supporters but did not fully satisfy Northerners who wanted to limit or abolish slavery.
- Wisconsin, a free state, is admitted to the Union.
- Oregon Treaty between the United States and Great Britain ends the Oregon boundary dispute, defines final western segment of Canada – United States border and ends the scare of a U.S.–Great Britain war. Northern Democrats complain the Polk Administration backed down on the demand that the northern boundary of Oregon be set at 54° 40' line of latitude and sacrificed Northern expansion while supporting Southern expansion through the Mexican-American War and the treaty ending that war.
- The Polk administration offers Spain $100 million for Cuba.
- Southerners support Narciso Lopez's attempt to cause an uprising in Cuba in favor of American annexation of the island, which allows slavery. Lopez is defeated and flees to the United States. He is tried for violation of neutrality laws but a New Orleans jury fails to convict him.
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| 1849 |
- The California Gold Rush suddenly populates Northern California with Northern and immigrant settlers who outnumber Southerner settlers. California's constitutional convention unanimously rejects slavery and petitions to join the union as a free state without first being organized as a territory. President Taylor asks Congress to admit California as a free state, says he will suppress secession if it is attempted by any dissenting states.
- Harriet Tubman escapes from slavery. She makes about 20 trips to the South and returns along the Underground Railroad with slaves seeking freedom.
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