Ultimate Timeline

1763

Event

• End of French and Indian War

Significance

-Established Proclamation Line

-end of Salutary Neglect

-beginning of heavy taxation on colonies

-Sugar Act

-leads to boycott of British goods

1765

Event

Stamp Act Congress

-Quartering

Siginfiance

First time that representatives of the colonies had gathered and acted collectively, precipitating the formation of the Continental Congress and the onset of the American Revolution

1774-75

Event

-Continental Congresses

Siginificance

-response to Coercive Acts(and Tea Act and Townshend Duties)

-creation of Continental Army

1776(July 4)

Event

-Declaration of Independence

Significance

-United States of America severs ties with Britain

1777-1781

Event

-Articles of Confederation drafted and ratified

Significance

-weak, but necessary

-fear of strong central government

1783(Sept 3)

Event

-Treaty of Paris

Significance

-end of Revolutionary War

-Britain west of Mississippi

1786

Event

- Shays’s Rebellion

Significance

-highlighted the weaknesses of the Articles of Confederation and ultimately spurred the need for a stronger federal government, leading to the drafting and ratification of the U.S. Constitution

1787

Event

-Northwest Ordinance: Significance -no slavery north of Ohio River

-determined how new territories would be administered

-determined how new states would be admitted

-set aside $$ for public schooling

-invalidates Native American claims to land

-Constitutional Convention: Signifiance -drafting of the US Constitution

1789-1797

Event

Washington’s Presidency

-Jay’s Treaty

-XYZ affair

-Whiskey Rebellion

-Treaty of Greenville

Significance

-upheld the Constitution

-Stepped down at end of to terms (Washington’s Presidency)

-established foreign and domestic policy of USA(Jay’s Treaty affair)

1791

Event

-Bill of Rights ratified: Significance - follow through on promise from Constitutional Convention

-secure the right of American Citizens from powerful gov’t

-Bank of US chartered: Significance -first use of “Necessary and Proper” clause

-division b/w Hamiltonian Federalists and Jeffersonian Republicans

-”First Party System” with Federalists and Democratic Republicans

1793

Event

Cotton Gin invented: Significance -less slaves can do more work

-expansion of cotton farming into the deep south

1790s

Event

Second Great Awakening: Significance -women gain more emotional religious power

-expansion of church membership

-greater equality among people

1800

Event

Jefferson Elected: Significance -first transfer of power from one party to another

1803

Event

Louisiana Purchase: Significance -US territory doubles in size

-Lewis and Clarke exploration of West

1808

Event

Outlaw Atlantic Slave trade:Significance -had a profound impact on the United States, particularly in the context of slavery and the abolitionist movement. While it halted the international slave trade to the US, it also fueled the growth of a domestic slave trade and intensified sectional tensions leading to the Civil War

1812-15

War of 1812: Significance -freedom of seas

-retain “our good name”

-increased manufacturing in USA

-leads to Market Revolution

-industrialism leads to deep class divisions

1817-25

Event

Era of Good Feeling

-Monroe and Adams

Significance

-peace and unity in the country

-Monroe Doctrine

1801-22

Event

Marshall Court

-Marbury v. Madison

-McCulloch v. Maryland

-Gibbons v. Ogden

-Dartmouth College v. Woodward

Significance

-established national supremacy

-established judicial review

1820

Event

Missouri Compromise: Significance -further solidifies slavery in south

-establishes 36^o 30’ parallel for slavery boundary

1824

Event

Favorite Son Election: Significance -James Quincy Adams elected by the House of Representatives

-end of “First Party System” with Republicans and

Clay’s American System: Significance- boosts American manufacturing, levies tariffs on foreign goods

1828

Event

Jackson elected: Significance -”self-made man”

-first election with the common man voting

-executive orders

1830

Event

Indian Removal Act: Significance -opens the deep south to slavery and cotton/sugar farming

-Indians moved across the Mississippi River

1830s

Event

Minstrelsy Shows: Significance - growth of free time

William Lloyd Garrison The Liberator: Significance - rise of abolitionism and women’s rights movements

Cotton South: Significance - gang labor system

-slavery as “positive good”

-less whites own slaves — increase in big plantations owned by wealthy gentry

1834

Event

Whig Party established: Significance - Clay, Webster, Calhoun

-establishes “Second Party System” with Whigs and Democrats

1837

Panic of 1837: Significance -Martin van Buren fails to deal adequately with economic crisis

1840s-50s

Manifest Destiny: Significance -settling the American frontier

-final conflicts with Indians

-Oregon = conflict with Mexico

-Texas = conflict with Mexcio

-admission of California(slave or free??) state splits 36^o 30’ line

1846

Brigham Young leads Mormons to Salt Lake: Significance - clashes with US government and public morality

Mexican War and Wilmot Proviso: Significance -increased sectionalism

-extends American territory to the Pacific Ocean

1848

Seneca Falls Convention: Significance -proposes women’s equality

Free Soil Party: Significance - small freehold, ant-slavery b/c they can’t compete with large plantations

Gold Found CA: Significance - increased westward migration and settlement

1850

Compromise of 1850(“Slavery follows the flag”) : Significance -Fugitive Slave Act angers northerners

- preserves the Union, but doesn’t fix anything

-attempt to resolve tensions between slave and free states

- California admitted as a free state

- stronger fugitive slave laws enacted.

-abolished slave trade(but not slavery) in D.C.

-popular sovereignty established in Utah and New Mexico territories

1851

American “Know-Nothing” Party formed: Significance- anti-immigrant

-nativists

1852

Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin: Significance -shows white Americans the true horrors of slavery

1850s

Immigrant from German and Ireland: Significance -Gold Rush

-farmers(anti-slavery) settle west

-factory workers replace native-born women in textile mills

1854

Kansas-Nebraska Act: Significance -challenges idea of Popular Sovereignty

Republican Party: Significance -anti-slavery party

-becomes catch-all for other parties(Whigs and Free-Soilers)

-based in north

1856

Bleeding Kansas:Significance - turmoil over slavery and admission of KS as slave state

James Buchanan elected president: Significance -did nothing to preserve the Union and stem sectionalism

-admits KS as slave state

-seeks to buy Cuba and make it a slave state

1857

Dred Scott v. Sandford: Significance - nullified the Missouri Compromise and ruled that African Americans could not be citizens.

-slavery could not be excluded from any state in the Union

1859

John Brown’s raid on Harper’s Ferry: Significance - spill over KS

-taking matter into his own hands

Comstock Lode discovered: Significance - fear that currency will become unbalanced. Leads to establishing the gold standard in 1873

1860

Abraham Lincoln elected: Significance - runs on an anti-slavery platform, prompting Southern states to secede from the Union.

-South Carolina seceded first

1861

Lincoln inaugurated

Ft. Sumter: Significance- Civil War starts

-proof that Lincoln will bring Confederate states back into the Union

1862

Homestead Act: Significance- makes it affordable to settle the west

Transcontinental Railroad Act(also known as the pacific railroad act): Significance - increases trade and travel out west

Morrill Act: Significance - public state universities

1863

Emancipation Proclamation: Significance - frees all slaves still held in Confederate- controlled areas

-adds moral component to the war. No longer just about preserving the union, but also about freeing the slaves

1865

13 Amendment: Significance -free all slaves. Sharecropping eventually becomes solution to labor problems and job shortages in South

Lee surrender(April 9): Significance - Civil War ends. Unconditional surrender by the Confederacy

Lincoln assassinated(April 14): Significance -national loses moral compass and plan for reunification

-Johnson becomes president

-Black Codes passed in the South

1866

Civil Rights Act: Significance -Congress overrides Johnson’s vetoes

1867

Seward purchases Alaska: Significance -Gold Rush in the Yukon

-crucial during the Cold War

1868

Johnson impeached: Significance - congress challenges his policies

-he is acquitted

14th Amendment ratified: Significance -citizenship for all people born or naturalized in US

-equal protection of the law

U.S. Grant elected: Significance - Radical Reconstruction. Occupation of the South known for corruption

Burlingame Treaty: Significance - Limits Chinese immigration in USA

1869

Wyoming Women suffrage: Significance -small population

-women helped settle the west and were rewarded

Knights of Labor founded: Significance -national labor union open to any race or gender. Believed workers should have control over their industries

-membership peaked in 1884

1870

KKK and Enforcement Laws: Significance -national government attempts to place limits on the Klan

-shows how strong and big of a problem the Klan is

15th Amendment ratified: Significance -right to vote for all men(including blacks). Some abolitionist women did not like that black men were getting the right of suffrage before them

1872

Yellowstone National Park established: Significance -reclaimed from Indian Land

-shows need to preserve our nation from destructive farming, mining and cattle ranching

1873-79

Panic of 1873: Significance -Economic downtown. Halts railway expansion

-era of deskilling labor under mass production

1876

Battle of Little Bighorn: Significance -beginning of the end for Indian rebellion

-decisive victory for Sioux forces over the U.S. Army led by General Custer, highlighting the tensions between Native Americans and settlers.

1877

Hays becomes president: Significance -Reconstruction officially ends

-withdrawal federal troops from the south

-anti-Black Democrats seize control of southern legislatures

-things become very bad for Blacks in the south

1879

Exodusters to Kansas: Significance -first mass migration of blacks out of the south

1881

Tuskegee Institute founded: Significance -Booker T. Washington supports black advancement through education, supporting small businesses and “accommodation”

1882

Rockefeller establishes (Standard Oil Trust): Significance - rise of big business and corporations

-uses tactics to drive all businesses out

Chinese Exclusion Act: Significance - increases illegal immigration

-institutionalizes racism

-negatively impacts Chinese families

1886

Haymarket Square: Significance -set labor movement back. People saw it as violent

-anarchists has a lot of power

American Federation of Labor founded: Significance -”pure and simple unionism”

-limited to only workers, organized by trade/craft

-used collective bargaining to push for better wages, hours and conditions

-Samuel Gompers

1887

Dawes Severalty Act: Significance -seeks to assimilate Indians

-forces all Indians onto reservations

-forced them to farm

-established schools for children to take away culture

Interstate Commerce Act: Significance -attempted to regulate RR industry. Didn’t give fed gov’t a way to enforce it

1889

Hull House founded: Significance -settlement houses are created to help new immigrants from eastern Europe

1890

Battle Wounded Knee: Significance - end of all Indian rebellion

Sherman Antitrust Act: Significance - is not enforced, but shows that Trusts are a problem and need to be regulated

1892

Ellis Island opened: Significance -deals with flood of immigrants from Eastern and Southern Europe. Most are poor and uneducated have no skills

1893

Depression of 1893: Significance - mass unemployment

-many corporate mergers as smaller businesses went under

1896

Plessy v. Ferguson: Significance - established "separate but equal" doctrine, legitimizing racial segregation.

-legalizes “separate but equal”

-leads to Jim Crow laws and segregation in the south

1898

Spanish-American War: Significance - Yellow Journalism

-US acquires overseas territory and becomes an imperial nation(Hawaii, Puerto Rico, Guam, and Philippines)

-American exceptionalism

-surge of nationalism “Remember the Maine”

-pursue “Open-Door Policy” to trade with China

1900

Big Business is KING: Significance - 100 largest companies in America control 1/3 of national productive capacity

1901

Teddy Roosevelt becomes president: Significance - ushers in Progressive Era

-National Parks

-Roosevelt Corollary and Panama Canal

J.P. Morgan creates US Steel: Significance - America’s first billion-dollar corporation

1906

The Jungle published: Significance -Upton Sinclair shed light on the meat-packing industry

1909

NAACP established: Significance - it became the nation's oldest and largest civil rights organization, playing a crucial role in the struggle for equality and justice for African Americans and all people of color

1911

Triangle Shirtwaist Company fire:Significance - led to new legislation about ventilation, fire safety, building exits, etc.

1912

Woodrow Wilson elected: Significance -president during WWI

-favors active wartime foreign policy

1913

16th Amendment: Significance -federal income tax

17th Amendment: Significance- direct election of senators

Federal Reserve Act: Significance - established central bank to oversee fiscal policy and to regulate the economy through interest rates

1914

Clayton Antitrust Act: Significance -actually effective in breaking up trusts and monopolies

WWI starts in Europe: Significance -US attempts to hold on to neutrality

Great Migration:Significance - African Americans move north to work in factories

-leads to race riots in norther cities after the war

-new rise of the KKK(even in the north)

Panama Canal opens: Significance - US now becomes a naval power with access to Atlantic and Pacific oceans

-increased trade between east and west coast and from Asia to east coast.

1917

US joins WWI: boost morale of Allied troops, break the trenches in France

-sinking of Lusitania:

-Zimmerman Note

1918

WWI ends (November 11): Significance -Wilson proposes 14 Points and League of Nations

-US Senate refuses to pass the Treaty of Versailles

-Spanish Flu spreads throughout the world

1920

19th amendment: Significance -women get right to vote

Red Scare: Significance - fear of communism spreading after Russian Revolution in 1917

-crack down on socialist beliefs that came out of Progressive Era

1920s

Roaring 20s: Significance - women’s freedom, speakeasies, mass culture, consumer culture and debt, cars, movies, sports

-Harlem Renaissance

-Hollywood

-Prohibition

Republican support of big business

1924

National Origins Act: Significance- Places quotas/restrictions on immigrants from each country

1929

Black Tuesday(Oct. 29) and Great Depression: Significance -stock market crash

-debt

-industrial production slows

-unemployment soars

-Hoover was President and did not take adequate measures to mitigate the economic downturn in the beginning, leading to widespread poverty and hardship.

1933-1941

FDR inaugurated: Significance -Democratic platform of the Welfare State is solidified

-FDR is elected 4 times

New Deal: Significance -creates public works projects to put people to work

-Social Security Act

-increased bureaucracy

1933

Hitler comes to power: Significance -policy of appeasement is adopted by Britain and France

-US issues Neutrality Act in 1935

1939

WWII starts: Significance -Europe is drawn in quickly

-Lend/Lease policy to help Britain and USSR

-Great Depression ends due to war spending

1941

Event

Pearl Harbor(-US enters WWII on two fronts): Significance - fight Japan in the Pacific theater and Germany in the European theater

-Japanese-American internment(E.O. 9066)

-armed forces still segregated

-FDR dies in 1945, Truman makes the decision to drop the atomic bombs

-rationing and Victory gardens

-Married women take war jobs

1944

Event

D-Day(June 6): Significance - British, American and Canadian troops invade France and break German occupation in Western Europe

1945

VE Day(May 7): Significance - victory in Europe

-British/American troops meets Soviets at the Elbe River

-Potsdam Conference to conclude peace

VJ Day(Aug 10): Significance - victory in Japan

-Hideki surrenders after atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki

1945

Event

Peace: Significance -United Nations founded

-GI Bill

-baby boom

1945-1980

Event

Cold War: Significance -fear of communism

-Containment policies

-Truman Doctrine

-Marshall Plan

-NATO

1950s

Events

Mc Carythism and Red Scare: Significance -hunt for American communists, black lists, etc

Korean War: Significance - protection of democratic South Korea. Ends with DMZ at the 38th Parallel

• Civil Rights Movement: Significance - movement strong in the south. Brings issues to the forefront in national news

  -African American children can go to white schools, but it is a fight

  -follow MLK’s teachings of peaceful resistance

  -sets stage for Civil Rights Act in 1964-65

  • Brown v. BOE

  • Montgomery Bus Boycott

  • Little Rock integration

-Military Industrial Complex: Significance -arms race, belief that we are the biggest and baddest

-Eisenhower’s presidency: Significance -national highway system

-warned against Military Industrial Complex