Chronology of the 1850's Sectional Struggle

CHRONOLOGY
1846 Wilmot Proviso fuses question of slavery's expansion with consequences of Mexican War. Walker tariff, adopted for revenue only, eliminates principle of protection.
1848 Gold discovered on American River in California. Van Buren, running for president on Free-Soil ticket, receives 10 percent of popular vote. Zachary Taylor elected president.
1850 In Congress, violent sectional debate culminates in Compromise of 1850. Fugitive Slave Law requires federal agents to recover escaped slaves from sanctuaries in the North. Taylor's death makes Millard Fillmore president.
1851 Herman Melville's Moby Dick.
1852 Franklin Pierce elected president. Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin.
1853 Upsurge of political nativism, the Know-Nothings.
1854 Spectacular Know-Nothing election victories. Collapse of Whigs.
1854 New Republican party emerges. Commodore Perry opens Japan to American trade. Kansas-Nebraska Act rekindles sectional controversy over slavery.
1856 John Brown's murderous raid at Pottawatomie Creek. James Buchanan elected president.
1857 Dred Scott decision. In Kansas, proslavery Lecompton constitution ratified as free-state men refuse to vote.
1858 Lincoln-Douglas debates.
1859 John Brown's raid on Harpers Ferry.
1860 Democratic party deadlocked at Charleston convention finally divides along sectional lines at Baltimore. Abraham Lincoln elected president. South Carolina secedes from the Union.
1861 Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, and Texas secede.
(Bernard Bailyn, The Great Republic Page 461)