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First Enslaved Africans Arrive
Founded in Jamestown in 1607, the Virginia colony in 1619 was home to about 700 people, but on August 20, 1619, Angolans, kidnapped by the Portuguese, arrived at Virginia in the British Colony and then brought by the English Colonists. That arrival of the enslaved Africans in the New World was the mark of the beginning of two and a half centuries of Slavery in North America. -
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13th Amendment
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Germantown Quaker Petition Against Slavery
The Germantown Quaker Petition against slavery in 1688 was the first protest against African American slavery that was made by a religious body in the English Colonies. This petition utilized various arguments for equal human rights and the unjust nature of slaveholding, but the petition manly appealed to the "Golden Rule". The petition stated that Liberty should be extended to all people, regardless of their color, and we should act in ways to all people as we would like done to ourselves. -
Georgia was the Last State to Legalize Slavery
Between 1735 and 1750 Georgia was unique among Britain's American Colonies, as it was the only state that tried to prohibit Slavery as a matter of public policy. The Trustees, the founders of Georgia, made their decision to have slavery banned for they wanted settlers to have a comfortable living experience. Georgian's during the late 1730s demanded slavery be allowed. They bombarded the trustees with letters and petitions. Years later the Trustees gave in and in 1751 legalized Slavery. -
Pennsylvania Abolition Slavery
The Society for the Relief of slavery unlawfully was held in Bondage, the first dedicated American society to the cause of Abolition was founded on April 14, 1775, in Philadelphia. As it gained momentum, the abolitionist caused increasing friction between states in the North and the South. Critics of the Abolition that is contradicted the U.S. constitution, which left the option of slavery up to the individual states. -
Gradual Abolition Act
The Gradual Abolition Act was the first extensive abolition legislation that passed the Pennsylvania General assembly on March 1, 1780. To appease the slave owners the act gradually emancipated enslaved people without making slavery immediately illegal. The act did permit Pennsylvania slaveholders to keep their enslaved individuals they already owned unless they failed to register then annually but at the same time provided the freedom to those who were newly born into slavery. -
John Marrant
John Marrant was the first black to publish a book, a memoir, about his life that he later published in 1785 in London as a Narrative of the Lord's Wonderful Dealings. Marrant's narrative is both the story of his Indian captivity and a spiritual autobiography. -
The Northwest Ordinance
The Northwest Ordinance which was adopted on July 13, 1787, by the confederation Congress, chartered a government for the Northwest Territory. There were three principal provisions ordained in the document. One is a division in the Northwest Territory. Two is a three-stage method for admitting a new state to the union. Three, a bill of rights protecting religious freedom, the right to a writ of habeas corpus, the benefit of trial by jury, other individual rights, education, and forbade slavery. -
Congress Enacts First Fugitive Salve Law
Congress passes the first fugitive slave law that required all states, including those that forbid slavery, to return slaves who have escaped from other states to their original owners. The laws stated that not one person held to service or labor in one state, escaping into another, shall, in consequence of any law or regulation therein, be discharged from such labor or service or labor, but shall be delivered up on claim of the party to whom such service or labor may be due.” -
Congress Enacts the Federal Slave Trade
The act that was signed into law by President George Washington, was an early step into ending the international slave trade. The act prohibited slaves from the United States to any foreign place or country. The act also made it illegal for American citizens to outfit a ship for purposes of importing slaves. The act did not affect foreign nations, and their importation of slaves and the penalties for Americans convicted under this law were fined and did not include incarceration. -
Petition of Absalom Jones
In this petition, Absalom Jones, a former slave and other freemen of Philadelphia decried the slave trade, describing the kidnapping and enslavement of African Americans. They did not demand immediate emancipation of all slaves but implored Congress to ameliorate the cruel effects of the 1793 Fugitive Slave Act. -
The 1807 Act
Thus act abolished the Slave Trade in the British colonies. It became illegal to carry slaves in British ships. But Finally, on 25 March 1807, the Abolition of the Slave Trade Act received its royal assent, abolishing the slave trade in the British colonies and making it illegal to carry enslaved people in British ships. The abolitionists had assumed that ending the Slave Trade would eventually lead to the freeing of all enslaved people. When it became clear this would not happen. -
Freed U.S. slaves depart on journey to Africa
The first organized immigration of freed slaves to Africa from the United States was from the New York harbor on a journey to Freetown, Sierra Leone, in West Africa. The expedition was also partially funded by the U.S. Congress, which in 1819 had appropriated $100,000 to be used in returning displaced Africans, illegally brought to the United States after the abolishment of the slave trade in 1808, to Africa. The program was modeled after the British’s efforts to resettle freed slaves in 1772. -
Harriet Tubman Escapes Slavery
Tubman first encountered the Underground Railroad when she used it to escape slavery herself in 1849. Following an illness and the death of her owner, Tubman decided to escape slavery in Maryland for Philadelphia. Two of her brothers, Ben and Harry, accompanied her on September 17, 1849. Harry and Ben had second thoughts and returned to the plantation. Tubman had no plans to remain in bondage. Seeing her brothers safely home, she soon set off alone for Pennsylvania. -
The Compromise of 1850
The Compromise of 1850 consists of five laws passed in September of 1850 that dealt with the issue of slavery and territorial expansion. In 1849 California requested permission to enter the Union as a free state, but upsetting the balance between the free and slave states in the U.S. Senator Henry Clay introduced a series of resolutions in an attempt to seek a compromise. As part of the Compromise of 1850, the Fugitive Slave Act was amended and the slave trade in Washington, D.C. was abolished. -
Convention of 1856 in Philadelphia
The new Republican Party was born in 1854 at a meeting in Ripon, Wisconsin. The new party was an umbrella that took in members of the rapidly disintegrating Whig Party, abolitionists, Free-Soilers, and anti-slavery Democrats. The three-day convention kicked off on June 17. About 600 delegates attended the convention. More than 100 newspaper reporters were seated at tables in the front of the auditorium. The key thing was firm opposition to the extension of slavery. -
Lincoln Becomes President
The United States Presidential Election was held on November 6, 1860. Abraham Lincoln was elected the 16th president of the United States. Lincoln, a representative to Congress, first gained national stature during his campaign against Stephen Douglas of Illinois for a U.S. Senate seat in 1858. The announcement of Lincoln’s victory signaled the secession of the Southern states, which since the beginning of the year had been threatening if the Republicans gained the White House. -
The Civil War
The ongoing conflict between North and South over the issue of slavery had led to the Southern to discuss a unified separation from the United States. By 1860, the majority of the slave states were threatening secession if the Republicans won the presidency. Abraham Lincoln’s victory over the Democratic Party in November 1860, immediately initiated secession proceedings. South Carolina legislature passed the “Ordinance of Secession". -
13th Amendment is Passed
The 13th Amendment that was ratified in 1865 in the aftermath of the Civil War had abolished slavery in the United States. The 13th Amendments have stated, “Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.”
