1850s

John Brown raided the federal arsenal at Harper’s Ferry to obtain arms for a slave insurrection. Charles Darwin Published “Origin of Species”. The US Supreme Court rules on the Dred Scott Case, a slave seeking freedom, and the Court found that slaves were property, not citizens, thus had no rights. In the meantime, abolitionists such as Sojourner Truth and Frederick Douglass give inspirational speeches and fight to free slaves. At the “Under the Oaks Convention” in Jackson, Michigan the first statewide candidates were selected for what would become the Republican Party.

1800-09 | 1810s | 1820s | 1830s | 1840s | 1850s | 1860s | 1870s | 1880s | 1890s

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November 24, 1859

Charles Darwin Publishes ‘Origin of the Species’ Theorizing that Species Originated by Evolutionary Means

Charles Darwin published his thesis 'Origin of the Species' on November 24th, 1859 - after more than twenty years of waiting to formerly resurrect the age old theory that had never gained any ground prior to his publishing. Maybe it just needed the backing of an anti-Christian, Illuminist power behind it to attack the Biblical creation story and Judaeo-Christian belief that God is the creator of ...
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October 16, 1859

John Brown Raided the Federal Arsenal at Harper’s Ferry to Obtain Arms for a Slave Insurrection

Just after sundown on the evening of Sunday October 16, 1859 John Brown led a group of 21 men (16 white and 5 black) across the Potomac River from Maryland to Virginia. Their immediate objective was the capture of the cache of weapons stored at the U.S. Arsenal at Harpers Ferry. Brown's ultimate goal was to destroy the slave system of the South. The arms captured by ...
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January 1, 1859

Secret Document ‘The Permanent Instructions of the Alta Vendita: A Masonic Blueprint for the Subversion of the Catholic Church’ is Published

The Permanent Instruction of the Alta Vendita (commonly called the Alta Vendita) is a document, originally published in French in 1859, purportedly produced by the highest lodge of the Italian Carbonari and written by "Piccolo Tigre," codename for Giuseppe Mazzini. In his book 'Athanasius and the Church of Our Time', Bishop Rudolph Graber quoted a Freemason who declared that “the goal (of the Illuminati) is no longer ...
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August 3, 1857

Frederick Douglass delivered a “West India Emancipation” speech: “The limits of tyrants are prescribed by the endurance of those whom they oppress.”

On August 3, 1857, Frederick Douglass delivered a “West India Emancipation” speech at Canandaigua, New York, on the twenty-third anniversary of the event. Most of the address was a history of British efforts toward emancipation as well as a reminder of the crucial role of the West Indian slaves in that own freedom struggle. However shortly after he began Douglass sounded a foretelling of the coming ...
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March 6, 1857

US Supreme Court Rules on the Dred Scott Case, a Slave Seeking Freedom. Court Found that Slaves Were Property, Not Citizens, thus Had No Rights.

In March 1857, in one of the most controversial events preceding the American Civil War (1861-65), the U.S. Supreme Court issued its decision in the case of Dred Scott v. Sanford. The case had been brought before the court by Dred Scott, a slave who had lived with his owner in a free state before returning to the slave state of Missouri. Having failed to purchase his ...
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May 22, 1856

The Caning of Abolitionist Senator Charles Sumner by Democrat

A statue at the Boston Public Garden is a reminder of the political violence that our nation experienced leading up to the Civil War. On May 19 and 20, 1856, Senator Charles Sumner, a Massachusetts antislavery Republican, delivered a long speech denouncing the power that slave owners held over their elected representatives. On May 22nd, 1856 Charles Sumner sat at his desk in the near empty ...
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February 8, 1856

A NY Tribune Article Suggests that Sharps Rifle was an “effective weapon to fight pro-slavery Democrats” and Becomes known as “Beecher’s Bible”

He was one of the most popular preachers in American in the middle 1800s. He was the brother of Harriett Beecher Stowe, who wrote the anti-slavery novel Uncle Tom’s Cabin in 1852. His name was Henry Ward Beecher. He purchased the chains that held John Brown in prison, dragging them across the stage and stomping on them as he preached against slavery. Beecher also supported women ...
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July 6, 1854

Under the Oaks Convention: The First Mass Gathering of the Republican Party

In 1854, just after the anniversary of the nation on the 6th of July, an anti-slavery state convention was held in Jackson, Michigan. The hot day forced the large crowd outside to a nearby oak grove. At this “Under the Oaks Convention” the first statewide candidates were selected for what would become the Republican Party. United by desire to abolish slavery, it was in Jackson that ...
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May 30, 1854

President Franklin Pierce signed the divisive Kansas-Nebraska Act into Law

In 1854, Senator Stephen Douglas of Illinois proposed a bill to organize the Territory of Nebraska, a vast area of land that would become Kansas, Nebraska, Montana and the Dakotas. Known as the Kansas-Nebraska Act, the controversial bill raised the possibility that slavery could be extended into territories where it had once been banned. Its passage intensified the bitter debate over slavery in the United States, which would later explode ...
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March 20, 1854

First Republican Party meeting in Ripon, Wisconsin.

This simple frame schoolhouse, built in 1853, holds a powerful history. In the Little White Schoolhouse a decision made by a small group of Ripon citizens changed the course of our nation’s history. A meeting in this simple, one story clapboard and frame schoolhouse on March 20, 1854, and another in Jackson, Michigan, on July 6, to protest passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act, which permitted the ...
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June 29, 1853

Communist Defector and Christian Convert Orestes Brownson: “The Great Object was to get Rid of Christianity, and to Convert our Churches into Halls of Science”

It has taken more than a century and a half for the government schools to degenerate into the militantly anti-Christian, nightmarish system that it is today. However, the socialist propagandists of the 1830s did indeed intend that their proposed system would take us to our present predicament. One of the architects of the public-school movement during that period was co-founder with Robert Dale Owen and Frances ...
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July 5, 1852

Abolitionist Frederick Douglass Gives Iconic “The Meaning of July Fourth for the Negro” Speech

Frederick Douglass (1818-95) was a prominent American abolitionist, author and orator. Born a slave, Douglass escaped at age 20 and went on to become a world-renowned anti-slavery activist. His three autobiographies are considered important works of the slave narrative tradition as well as classics of American autobiography. Douglass’ work as a reformer ranged from his abolitionist activities in the early 1840s to his attacks on Jim ...
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February 23, 1852

Daniel Webster: The Dignity and Importance of History Speech: “The First Element in History is Truthfulness.”

The Dignity and Importance of History February 23, 1852 Source: Shewmaker, 130-137 The object of your association [the Historical Society of New York], gentlemen, like that of others of similar character, is highly important. Historical societies are auxiliary to historical compositions. They collect the materials from which the great narrative of events is, in due time, to be framed. The transactions of public bodies, local histories, ...
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May 29, 1851

Abolitionist, Sojourner Truth, Delivers “Ain’t I a Woman?” Speech at the Women’s Convention in Akron, Ohio

Sojourner Truth was a slave-turned abolitionist. She became a Methodist and was called to ministry. Truth delivered a speech entitled “Ain’t I a Woman?” in 1851 that demanded equality for women and African Americans. As a preacher, she said that Jesus overcame her hatred of white people. Her faith gave her the ability to love everyone. The speech was briefly reported in two contemporary newspapers, and ...
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