American History Timeline

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American history is a rich tapestry of constitutional, political, intellectual, economic, and competing social forces. Scroll down to read more about American History or click below to read up on specific topics about the history of the United States.

 

 

(See Main Article: The Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854)

The Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854 (10 Stat. 277) was an organic act that created the territories of Kansas and Nebraska.

The controversy over the Kansas Nebraska Act proved too much for the ramshackle Whig Party, which was torn apart by sectional antagonism. Filling the political vacuum left by the self-destruction of the Whig Party was the Republican Party, created in 1854 as a sectional party—just what so many American statesmen had tried to avoid. The Republicans attracted a variety of supporters with their free-soil position and their support for high protective tariffs.

As free-soilers, they opposed slavery in the territories, though the racialist motivation of such exclusion of slavery is clear from the party’s 1856 platform, which read, in part, that “all unoccupied territory of the United States, and such as they may hereafter acquire, shall be reserved for the white Caucasian race—a thing that cannot be except by the exclusion of slavery.” Their economic program, of which the protective tariff formed an important plank, could not have been better devised to attract Southern antipathy. Abraham Lincoln, who would be elected in 1860 as the first Republican president, had been a supporter of the protective tariff for several decades by the time he reached the White House.

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1861 – 1865: The Civil War

(See Main Article: American Civil War Summary)

Here’s a short American Civil War summary. It was a civil war fought in the United States from 1861 to 1865, between the North (the Union) and the South (the Confederacy).

A bit more context, however, is necessary. Strictly speaking, there never was an American Civil War. A civil war is a conflict in which two or more factions fight for control of a nation’s government. The English Civil War of the 1640s and the Spanish Civil War of the 1930s are two classic examples; in both cases, two factions sought to control the government. That was not the case in the United States between 1861 and 1865. The seceding Southern states were not trying to take over the United States government; they wanted to declare themselves independent.

(See Main Article: Civil War/Total War: The Extent of Battle from 1861 to 1865)

Did the North win by waging total war in the Civil War? Total war is a “war that is unrestricted in terms of the weapons used, the territory or combatants involved, or the objectives pursued, especially one in which the laws of war are disregarded.”

The contention of some historians that the Civil War was the first modern “total war,” setting the precedent for the murderous wars of the twentieth century, appears to be a new twist on the Myth of the Lost Cause. It implies that the Union prevailed by waging war of unethical scope and severity. “It was Lincoln, Grant, and the Civil War that incorporated total war into modern experience,” asserts Charles Strozier. He adds that “the totality of the modern state seems to require unconditional surrender as a necessary correlative of its total wars. The American Civil War brought that into focus.”

The accusation of brutality in the Union armies’ conquest of the South began right after the war. In 1866, Pollard contrasted the Yankees’ behavior with that of Lee’s army, which, he maintained, abided by its commander’s order to protect the property that lay in the path of its Gettysburg campaign. “No house was entered without authority; no granary was pillaged; no property was taken without payment on the spot, and vast fields of grains were actually protected by Confederate guards. . . . ” In fact, however, the rebels in Pennsylvania foraged extensively and confiscated livestock, transportation vehicles, and thousands of wagon loads of grains and produce—sufficient to constitute a fifteen-, twenty- or fifty-mile reserve train of wagons. Confederate “payments” for property were made in essentially worthless Confederate currency, and as many as several hundred blacks were kidnapped and sent South into slavery.

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(See Main Article: What Was the Emancipation Proclamation?)

President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation on January 1, 1863.  This executive order was a war measure directed at the rebel states and declared the ten states that were rebelling to be free. The proclamation excluded the areas that were under the Union’s control, but still applied to around 4 million slaves at that time. The Emancipation Proclamation was not a law that Congress had passed, but an executive order based on the president’s authority over the armed forces as specified in the Constitution.

In a way, the proclamation was a way to get more soldiers on the Union Army’s side. It specifies that suitable freed slaves could enroll and be paid to fight for the Union and that the Union’s military personnel had to recognize the freedom of these former slaves. Lincoln may have seen the Emancipation Proclamation as a necessity from a military perspective: in 1862 the Union wasn’t doing too well in the war. By taking away the Confederate’s slave workers, it would not only add to the strength of the Union Forces, but also weaken the Confederacy by taking away the labor that helps to produce their supplies.

(See Main Article: Lincoln’s Landslide Victory in the Election of 1864)

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In 1864, Lincoln once again demonstrated a political aggressiveness that matched Grant’s military aggressiveness. In that year’s political campaign, he, along with Republican Radicals, insisted that the Republican platform contain a plank advocating a constitutional amendment abolishing slavery. He encouraged his secretary of war to work with his generals to allow as many soldiers from non-absentee-ballot states as possible to return home to vote for president.

But the election of 1864 results, especially before the fall of Atlanta, were not pre-ordained. Lincoln was vulnerable because the North was divided on the issues of war, the draft, and slavery. There had been draft riots in New York City, anti-war “Copperhead” sentiment flourished in the Midwest, and the Democrats adopted a peace platform at their convention. Just after McClellan’s nomination, Secretary of the Navy Welles worried that “McClellan will be supported by War Democrats and Peace Democrats, by men of every shade and opinion; all discordant elements will be made to harmonize, and all differences will be suppressed.” The next day, however, he took a contrary position: “Notwithstanding the factious and petty intrigues of some professed friends . . . and much mismanagement and much feeble management, I think the President will be reelected, and I shall be surprised if he does not have a large majority.”

1865: End Of The Civil War

(See Main Article: When Did the Civil War End?)

The last battle of the Civil War was however only fought over a month later, at Palmito Ranch in Texas. Although an unofficial truce existed between the Union and the Confederates, Theodore H. Barrett ordered his Confederate soldiers to attack a Union camp close to Fort Brown. His reasons for attacking are unknown, and some say that he was just eager to lead his first attack before the war was officially over. The 34th Indiana’s Union Private John J. Williams is said to have been the last death in combat of the Civil War.

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1865: Abolition of Slavery in America

(See Main Article: Abolition of Slavery in America)

Passed by Congress on January 31, 1865, and ratified on December 6, 1865, the 13th amendment resulted in the abolition of slavery in America.

William Lloyd Garrison, the most prominent abolitionist in America, actually passed a resolution through his American Anti-Slavery Society insisting that it was the duty of each member to work to dissolve the American Union. (It read, “Resolved, That the Abolitionists of this country should make it one of the primary objects of this agitation to dissolve the American Union.”) He held this view in part because the North, once separated from the South, would no longer be morally tainted by its association with slavery (“No Union with slaveholders!” he declared), but also because he believed Northern secession would undermine Southern slavery. If the Northern states were a separate country, the North would be under no constitutional obligation to return runaway slaves to their masters. The Northern states would then become a haven for runaway slaves. The enforcement cost of Southern slavery would become prohibitive, and the institution would collapse.

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What is the 13th Amendment?

(See Main Article: What is the 13th Amendment?)

The 13th Amendment is a large milestone in the history of African-Americans. This amendment to the U.S. Constitution abolishes slavery and any service done involuntarily (except by court order as a punishment for a crime.)

It took about a year and a half for the 13th Amendment to be fully processed. After being passed by the Senate on April 8, 1864, it had to be approved by the House, which happened on January 31, 1865. On December 6, 1865, it was finally ratified by the majority of states needed to make it legal. The 13th Amendment was one of the three so-called Reconstruction Amendments, which were adopted within the five years after the Civil War.’

 Abraham Lincoln Assassination

(See Main Article: Who Assassinated Abraham Lincoln?)

On Good Friday, April 14, 1865, Abraham Lincoln was shot in the head in Ford’s Theatre’s presidential box by an actor, John Wilkes Booth. After shooting the President, Booth jumped on the stage and managed to escape through the theater’s back entrance. The first president to be assassinated, Lincoln died at the end of the Civil War, only five days after Confederate Robert E. Lee surrendered. President Lincoln was actually quite a fan of his assassin’s acting skills and had invited him previously to meet at the White House. Booth, who was a Confederate spy and rebel sympathizer evaded the invitation.

Booth and his co-conspirators had originally planned to kidnap Lincoln, but in the end, decided on an assassination instead. After Booth heard a speech by Lincoln in support of giving slaves citizenship, he was said to have promised that this speech would be his last. David Herold, George Atzerodt, and Lewis Powell were part of the assassination plot, in which they wanted to kill the President, the Vice President, and the Secretary of State at the same time. They hoped to wreak havoc in the Union by eliminating its three top people. Although the president was assassinated, the plot failed with Atzerodt fleeing and Powell only managing to wound the Secretary of State.

 

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(See Main Article: The Old West: Manifest Destiny, Oregon Trail, Native Americans, Gold Rush)

A group of soldiers opened fire on a group of Sioux at the Pine Ridge reservation in Wounded Knee Creek killing 153 Indian men, women and children.

 

World War I and the Great Depression

 

1917 – 1918: The United States Enters World War 1; Rejects Entry Into The League Of Nations

(See Main Article: World War 1: A Comprehensive Overview of the Great War)

The reason for America to become involved in WW1 was Germany’s unrestricted submarine warfare, which had already sunk several American merchant ships. The U.S. was initially contributed to the war by supplying raw materials, supplies, and money. American soldiers first arrived to the Western Front in the summer of 1918 and by the end of the war, over 4,000,000 U.S. military personnel had been mobilized. 110,000 Americans died during WW1, of which 43,000 lost their lives in the influenza pandemic. How the U.S. contributed to World War 1: Supplying raw materials, arms, and other supplies. The U.S. actually saved Britain and some other Allied powers from bankruptcy by joining the war. Previously, Britain and its allies used to buy supplies from the U.S. amounting to over 75 billion dollar per week. The American Expeditionary Forces were sent to all the campaigns the U.S. got involved in. By that time, the weary French and British troops were badly in need of relief. The first American soldiers reached Europe in June 1917 already, but only started fully participating in October in Nancy, France. The U.S. wanted its forces to be capable of operating independently but didn’t have the necessary supplies and trained troops in Europe yet at the time.

 

Why Did the League of Nations Fail?

(See Main Article: Why Did the League of Nations Fail?)

The League of Nations was the first intergovernmental organization that was established after World War 1 in order to try and maintain peace. It was headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland, and designed to be a forum for handling international disputes before they flared up into military action and caused domino effects that pulled ally nations into the conflict (as had happened with the Great War). Unfortunately, the League failed miserably in its intended goal: to prevent another world war from happening (WW2 broke out only two decades later). The idea was for the League of Nations to prevent wars through disarmament, collective security, and negotiation. It was also involved in other issues such as drug trafficking, arms trade, and global health. Although the League disbanded during WW2, it was replaced with the United Nations, which is still going strong today.

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1919: The Paris Peace Conference of 1919

(See Main Article: The Paris Peace Conference of 1919)

The Paris Peace Conference opened on January 18, 1919. Its task was the writing of five separate peace treaties with the defeated separate powers: Germany, Turkey, Bulgaria, Austria, and Hungary (now separate nations). The defeated Central Powers were not allowed to participate in the negotiations. The terms would be dictated to them. Russia was also not allowed to come. The world had been remade. Clemenceau, Lloyd George, and Wilson faced a daunting task. Even as they and all the other delegates sat down to their deliberations, borders and governments were being decided in tumult, anarchy, and armed conflict. Most of the crowned heads of Europe had been deposed. The Czar and his family had been murdered. The Kaiser was in exile in the Netherlands. Bavarian king Ludwig III had given way to a socialist revolt. Austria and Hungary had declared themselves republics, making Charles I an emperor without an empire (he would eventually go into exile in Switzerland, and later Madeira). The states of Poland, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, and Finland were reemerging from the past. Communist red flags popped up, however briefly, at points in the heart of Europe. German mercenary armies, the Freikorps, fought Bolsheviks in Germany, saving the secular, socialist Weimar Republic—and even tried to annex the Baltic States, in secular emulation of the Teutonic Knights.

1919 – 1920: The 19th Amendment Gives Women The Right To Vote

(See Main Article: When Were U.S. Women Given the Right to Vote?)

Although women already started to picket and petition for the right to vote in the 1800s, it literally took 70 years before Congress finally passed the 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. The right to vote, also known as woman suffrage, was an important step towards equality in the U.S. and the first women voted in 1920, after the 19th Amendment was ratified on August 18.

The first national women’s rights organization was launched in 1848 during a convention that took place in Seneca Falls, New York. Key figures in the early women’s suffrage movements were Lucretia Mott, Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony, who got arrested for voting illegally.

The 19th Amendment were passed by the Senate on June 4, 1919 after being only two votes over the two-thirds majority of 56-25. All the states received the amendment for ratification, and by March 1920, 36 states had approved. They were one state short of the required two-thirds as the Southern states were very against this amendment. Seven states had already rejected it, and it was up to Tennessee to make the final decision for or against woman suffrage. State legislators of Tennessee were heavily divided with a 48-48 tie and it was up to Harry T. Burn to cast the deciding vote. He, personally was against the amendment, but his mother managed to convince him and he voted for ratification. Bainbridge Colby, the U.S. Secretary of State, certified the amendment on August 26, 1920.

1920: Prohibition

(See Main Article: Prohibition: How it Happened, Why it Failed, and How it Still Affects America Today)

America has a strange relationship with alcohol. Certain drinks represented the darkest parts of the national psyche. Rum was once associated with slavery because sugar cane plantations that made rum were only profitable with chattel slavery. Whisky and hard cider were omnipresent in the 19th century, turning able-bodied men into drunkards who couldn’t support their families and left them to starve.

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But it was Prohibition that is strangest of all. America successfully outlawed alcohol, the first and only modern nation to do so. The unintended consequences were enormous: from physicians falsifying alcohol’s positive effects so they could write prescriptions for “medicine” and make a handsome profit, to record numbers of men converting to Judaism so they could administer alcohol in rabbinical ceremonies.

1929 – 1933: The Great Depression

(See Main Article: When did the Great Depression Start?)

The Great Depression was an economic depression that affected countries worldwide before the start of World War II. In most countries, it started in 1930 and its effects lasted for the next decade up until the middle 1940’s for some (after the war). It has been the most widespread, most devastating depression of the 20th century and showed exactly how fragile the economy actually is.

Most historians agree that the Great Depression started with Black Tuesday, with the crash of the stock market in October 29, 1929. Stock prices have begun to fall in early September already, but the crash of the 29th sent Wall Street in a frenzy and destroyed millions of investors. The devastating effects of this crash caused profits, prices, tax revenue, and personal income to drop and international trade decreased by over 50%, which, in turn, affected countries that relied on export. Over 25% of Americans lost their jobs (13 to 15 million people) and in several countries, unemployment skyrocketed to 33% of the population. The economy only started to recover around 1939 and during World War II when the industrial demands of the war boosted American factories.

 

American History Richard Nixon Becomes President

(See Main Article: Was Richard Nixon Impeached?)

Richard Nixon was never impeached, not because there were no impeachment proceedings against him, but because he resigned the presidency at the near-certain prospect of losing the impeachment vote and being removed from office. Nixon served as president of America between 1969 and 1974 and was, to date, the only president in American history to ever resign from office.

American History 1973: Vietnam Ceasefire Agreement Signed 

(See Main Article: The Cold War: Causes, Major Events, and How it Ended)

On January 22, 1973, in Paris, Secretary of State William Rogers and North Vietnam’s chief negotiator, Le Duc Tho, signed “An Agreement on Ending the War and Restoring Peace in Vietnam.” In announcing the ceasefire, Nixon said five times that it represented the “peace with honor” he had promised since the 1968 presidential campaign.

(See Main Article: Watergate Scandal Timeline)

A crucial event in American history happened on June 16, 1972, in room 214 of the Watergate Hotel in Washington, D.C., seven men gathered to finalize their plans to break into the Democratic National Committee’s (DNC) headquarters, located on the sixth floor of one of the Watergate complex’s six buildings.

On August 8, key Republican Senators informed the President that, once impeached, enough votes existed in the Senate to convict the President in the trial and remove him from office. That night, Richard Nixon addressed the nation from the Oval Office. He informed the American people that he no longer had a base of support in Congress. Therefore, he would not see the impeachment proceedings through to their conclusion. The nation needed a full-time president. In the interests of the nation, he would resign.

(See Main Article: The 1976 Presidential Election)

The 1976 presidential election was the first held in the wake of the Watergate scandal, which had consumed the Nixon presidency and resulted in Gerald R. Ford becoming president. Ford, the Republican candidate, was pitted against the relatively unknown former 1-term governor of Georgia, Jimmy Carter. Carter ran as a Washington outsider, a popular position in the post-Watergate era, and won a narrow victory.

(See Main Article: The Iranian Revolution: Persia Before, During, and After 1979)

In American history, Iranian “students” (they were actually revolutionary paramilitary forces acting with the full support of their government) stormed the U.S. embassy in Tehran and held fifty-two diplomats and other American citizens hostage. For 444 days these Americans were prisoners, regularly tortured and abused. Carter couldn’t get them out.

Global Assertiveness

American History 1980:  Republican Ronald Regan Elected President And Adopts Strong Anti-Communist Foreign Policy

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(See Main Article: Reagan Foreign Policy: Peace Through Strength)

The new conservative president summed up the aims of his foreign policy as “We win, and they lose.” In his first presidential news conference, Reagan stunned official Washington by denouncing the Soviet leadership as still dedicated to “world revolution and a one-world socialist-communist state.” As he put it in his 1990 autobiography, “I decided we had to send as powerful a message as we could to the Russians that we weren’t going to stand by anymore while they armed and financed terrorists and subverted democratic governments.”

(See Main Article: The Iran-Contra Affair)

In American history, the foreign-policy scandal known as the Iran-contra affair came to light in November 1986 when President Ronald Reagan confirmed reports that the United States had secretly sold arms to Iran. He stated that the goal was to improve relations with Iran, not to obtain the release of U.S. hostages held in the Middle East by terrorists (although he later acknowledged that the arrangement had in fact turned into an arms-for-hostages swap).

(See Main Article: When Was the Berlin Wall Torn Down?)

The Berlin Wall, often called the “Wall of Shame” and a symbol of the Iron Curtain of the Cold War, was torn down on November 9, 1989, two years after President Ronald Reagan challenged Mikhail Gorbachev to “tear down this wall.”

American History 1990: United States Works To Expel Iraq From Kuwait

(See Main Article: Middle East Wars: 1975-2007)

 

 

 

 

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April 29, 2023 <https://www.historyonthenet.com/america-history-timeline>
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“American History Timeline” History on the Net© 2000-2023, Salem Media.April 29, 2023