African American Timeline
"In every human Breast, God has implanted a Principle, which we call Love of Freedom; it is impatient of oppression and pants for Deliverance… The same Principle lives in us."
— Phillis Wheatley, 1774, an enslaved colonial American-born African poetess who captured the feelings of American-born Africans.
The story of African Americans is a complex and multifaceted narrative woven into the very fabric of American history. It’s a story of resilience, resistance, and the enduring pursuit of freedom and equality against formidable odds. This African American Timeline seeks to provide a chronological overview of key events, legal milestones, and cultural shifts that have shaped the African American experience, from the pre-colonial era to the present day. From the initial forced arrival on these shores to the ongoing fight for social justice, this African American Timeline reflects the indelible mark African Americans have left on the United States.
Before 1400: The Global Context of Slavery
Slavery, a practice with roots extending far beyond the shores of America, existed long before recorded history. Emerging in the wake of agriculture’s advent approximately 11,000 years ago, it became a fixture in ancient civilizations across the globe. Egypt, China, India, Greece, the Roman Empire, and the pre-Columbian societies of the Americas all engaged in various forms of enslavement. These practices encompassed debt-slavery, penal servitude, the subjugation of prisoners of war, child abandonment, and the inheritance of slave status through birth.
In Europe, slavery persisted from Classical times, gradually declining after the fall of the Roman Empire. While it diminished in Northern Europe by the 11th and 12th centuries, it remained prevalent in Southern and Eastern Europe, forming a standard component of society, economy, and trade across the Mediterranean. This presence along the Atlantic seaboard led to the appearance of African slaves in Italy, Spain, Southern France, and Portugal well before the European discovery of the New World.
Concurrently, an Arab-run slave trade flourished from the 8th century onward, further contributing to the complex global landscape of enslavement. It is also important to note that various African societies themselves practiced forms of slavery.
1441: The Dawn of the European Slave Trade in Africa
The year 1441 marks a significant turning point with the commencement of European involvement in the African slave trade. Portuguese captains Antao Gonçalvez and Nuno Tristao initiated this practice by capturing 12 Africans in Cabo Branco (modern Mauritania) and transporting them to Portugal as slaves. This event foreshadowed the immense and devastating transatlantic slave trade that would follow.
1472: Negotiation and Expansion
By 1472, the Portuguese had formalized their involvement in the slave trade through a negotiated agreement that also encompassed the exchange of gold and ivory. This marked the beginning of a systematic exploitation of African resources and people, leading to a demographic shift of staggering proportions. By the end of the 19th century, the consequences of this trade would result in the forced migration of over 11 million Africans to the Americas, vastly outnumbering the European migrants who arrived during the same period.
1494: Initial Arrival in the New World
The year 1494 witnessed the arrival of the first Africans in Hispaniola alongside Christopher Columbus. Significantly, these individuals were recorded as free persons, representing a brief and early instance of Africans arriving in the Americas outside the context of enslavement.
1503-1510: Systematic Enslavement in the Americas
The early 16th century saw a shift toward the systematic enslavement of Africans in the Americas. Between 1503 and 1510, the Spanish and Portuguese began importing African slaves to the Caribbean and Central America. These enslaved individuals were intended to replace the dwindling Native American populations in the arduous and dangerous work of gold mining. In 1510, King Ferdinand of Spain authorized the shipment of 50 African slaves to Santo Domingo, marking the beginning of the systematic transportation of enslaved Africans to the New World.
1581-1619: Early Presence in North America
The presence of Africans in North America dates back to the late 16th century. In 1581, the Spanish in St. Augustine, Florida, imported enslaved Africans. Later, in 1585, the first English colony in what would become the United States was established at Roanoke Island, North Carolina. However, the pivotal moment often cited in the history of African Americans is the arrival of a Dutch ship in Jamestown, Virginia, in 1619. This ship carried approximately 20 Africans, whose initial status appears to have been that of indentured servants. However, this would soon evolve into the institution of hereditary, lifetime enslavement that would define the lives of countless African Americans for generations to come.
1641-1776: Legalization, Resistance, and the Paradox of Freedom
The mid-17th century saw the formal legalization of slavery in the American colonies. In 1641, the Massachusetts Bay Colony legalized slavery, setting a precedent for other colonies to follow. While Rhode Island declared in 1651 that enslaved persons should be freed after ten years of service, this was an exception rather than the rule.
The 1660s marked a turning point as colonial assemblies began enacting laws, known as slave codes, that legally recognized and protected the institution of slavery. These codes severely restricted the liberty of enslaved people and solidified slavery as a fundamental part of the colonial economy and social order. Virginia legalized slavery in 1660, and in 1663, a Virginia court ruled that a child born to an enslaved mother was also a slave, cementing the principle of hereditary enslavement. In 1672, the King of England chartered the Royal African Company, actively encouraging the expansion of the British slave trade.
Despite the legal entrenchment of slavery, resistance was a constant presence. In 1676, Nathaniel Bacon (Bacon’s Rebellion) appealed to enslaved blacks to join his cause, reflecting the potential for alliances across racial lines. Simultaneously, voices against slavery began to emerge. Slavery was prohibited in West New Jersey, a Quaker settlement in South New Jersey, demonstrating the early influence of religious and moral objections to the practice.
By the 1730s, England was aggressively involved in the North American slave trade, with New York, Boston, and Charleston thriving as home ports for slave vessels. Georgia, in 1750, became the last of the British North American colonies to legalize slavery. In 1775, the Pennsylvania Society for Promoting the Abolition of Slavery was founded, becoming the world’s first anti-slavery society, and Benjamin Franklin became its Honorary President in 1787.
The year 1776 brought the adoption of the Declaration of Independence, proclaiming that "all men are created equal." However, this lofty ideal stood in stark contrast to the reality of slavery, which remained a legal institution in all 13 newly established states.
1777-1808: Gradual Abolition in the North and Constitutional Compromises
Following the Declaration of Independence, some Northern states began to address the issue of slavery. Vermont amended its constitution in 1777 to ban slavery, and over the next 25 years, other Northern states followed suit, emancipating their slaves and banning the institution. These state laws often stipulated gradual emancipation, reflecting a cautious approach to dismantling the system. Pennsylvania banned slavery in 1780, followed by Massachusetts and New Hampshire in 1783, and Connecticut and Rhode Island in 1784.
In 1787, slavery was made illegal in the Northwest Territory, which would eventually become the states of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, and Wisconsin. However, the U.S. Constitution, drafted in the same year, reflected the compromises necessary to form a unified nation. The Constitution forbade Congress from interfering with the slave trade before 1808, and enslaved persons were counted as three-fifths of a person for the purposes of representation in Congress.
In 1793, the U.S. Congress enacted the Fugitive Slave Act, aimed at protecting the rights of slave owners to retrieve runaways across state lines. This act intensified tensions between the North and the South. Eli Whitney’s invention of the cotton gin in the same year significantly increased the demand for slave labor, further entrenching the institution in the Southern economy. New York banned slavery in 1799, followed by New Jersey in 1804.
1808-1860: Internal Slave Trade, Resistance, and Growing Division
In 1807, British Parliament voted to abolish the trade in slaves, a significant step in the global movement against slavery. In 1807, Congress banned the importation of slaves, effective January 1, 1808. However, the internal slave trade continued to flourish in states where the institution remained legal. In 1800, Gabriel Prosser, an enslaved African American blacksmith, organized a slave revolt intending to march on Richmond, Virginia. The conspiracy was uncovered, and Prosser and many rebels were hanged. Virginia’s slave laws were subsequently tightened.
The Missouri Compromise of 1820-1821 admitted the slave state of Missouri and the free state of Maine into the Union, attempting to maintain a balance between free and slave states. The compromise also banned slavery north of the 36°30′ line of latitude in the Louisiana Territory. In 1822, Denmark Vesey, an enslaved African American carpenter who had purchased his freedom, planned a slave revolt to lay siege on Charleston, South Carolina. The plot was discovered, and Vesey and 34 co-conspirators were hanged.
In 1831, William Lloyd Garrison founded an abolitionist newspaper, The Liberator, in Boston, Massachusetts, signaling a dramatic shift in the anti-slavery movement. The abolitionist movement soon became the dominant voice among anti-slavery advocates, demanding an immediate end to slavery. In the same year, Nat Turner, a literate slave and preacher, instigated a slave revolt in Southampton County, Virginia. He and his followers killed 57 whites, but the revolt was unsuccessful, and up to 200 slaves were killed. The widespread fear of slave revolts, compounded by the rise of abolitionism, led legislatures across the South to increase the harshness of their slave codes.
In 1833, William Lloyd Garrison joined Arthur and Lewis Tappan to establish the American Anti-Slavery Society. In 1838, a Maryland slave named Fred ran away and later became Frederick Douglass, a prominent abolitionist and orator.
In 1842, in Prigg v. Pennsylvania, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the Fugitive Slave Law of 1793, stating that slaveowners had a right to retrieve their "property." However, the court also ruled that enforcing the Fugitive Slave Law was a federal responsibility, and states were not required to participate. Between 1842 and 1850, nine Northern states passed new personal liberty laws that forbade state officials from cooperating in the return of alleged fugitive slaves and barred the use of state facilities.
In 1845, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave, was published, launching the public career of the most notable black American spokesman of the 19th century. In 1846, the Wilmot Proviso, introduced by Democratic representative David Wilmot of Pennsylvania, attempted to ban slavery in territory gained in the Mexican-American War. Southerners blocked the proviso, but it continued to inflame the debate over slavery.
In 1848, the Free Soil Party was organized to stop the spread of slavery into Western territories. In 1849, Harriet Tubman escaped from slavery and became one of the most effective and celebrated leaders of the Underground Railroad.
The Compromise of 1850 required that California enter the Union as a free state; the slave trade (but not slavery) was abolished in Washington D.C.; the fugitive slave law was strengthened; and Utah and New Mexico Territories were opened to slavery, based on popular vote. In 1852, Uncle Tom’s Cabin, by Harriet Beecher Stowe, was published, depicting slavery as a horrible evil.
In 1854, the Kansas-Nebraska Act repealed the Missouri Compromise ban on slavery north of 36°30′ in the lands of the Louisiana Purchase, stipulating that slavery in the territories would be decided by popular sovereignty. This led to "Bleeding Kansas" in 1855-1856, a miniature civil war in Kansas Territory over the issue of slavery.
In 1857, the U.S. Supreme Court decided the Dred Scott case, ruling that Scott was still a slave with no standing to sue, that black Americans were not citizens, and that the federal government could not ban slavery in the territories. In 1858, Abraham Lincoln delivered his "House Divided" speech, asserting that the nation could not endure permanently half-slave and half-free. In 1859, John Brown failed in his attempt to capture the federal arsenal at Harper’s Ferry, West Virginia, becoming a martyr to the anti-slavery cause. The African American Timeline underscores the relentless fight against slavery, a fight that ultimately led to the Civil War.
1860-1877: Civil War, Emancipation, and Reconstruction
In 1860, Abraham Lincoln was elected president, further exacerbating tensions between the North and the South. In 1861, the Confederate States of America was founded when the Deep South seceded, and the Civil War began. The Secretary of the Navy authorized the enlistment of contrabands (slaves) taken in Confederate territories.
In 1863, President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation, declaring "that all persons held as slaves" within the Confederate states "are, and henceforward shall be free." The Presidential Order also authorized the mustering of black men as federal regiments. In 1864, Congress ruled that black soldiers must receive equal pay.
In 1865, the Civil War ended with a Northern victory. On June 19th, slavery in the United States effectively ended when 250,000 slaves in Texas finally received the news that the Civil War had ended two months earlier. The 13th Amendment abolished slavery throughout the United States. John Wilkes Booth assassinated President Abraham Lincoln, and Andrew Johnson became President and began to implement his own Reconstruction Plan that did not require the right to vote for black men in the former Confederate states. Many northern states rejected referendums to grant black men in their states the right to vote. Mississippi became the first of the former Confederate states to enact laws that severely limited the rights and liberties of blacks. The Freedmen’s Bureau was established in the War Department to supervise relief and educational activities relating to refugees and freedmen.
In 1866, all-white legislators of the former Confederate States passed the "Black Codes." Congress passed the Civil Rights Act, conferring citizenship on African Americans and granting them equal rights to whites. Ex-Confederates formed the Ku Klux Klan in Pulaski, Tennessee.
In 1868, the 14th Amendment was ratified, making all African Americans citizens. Whites began to attack black and white Republicans to suppress voting. In 1870, the 15th Amendment was passed, permitting black men the right to vote. Hiram Rhodes Revels became the first black member of the Senate.
In 1874, paramilitary groups that acted as the "military arm of the Democratic Party" in the South were founded: The White League in Louisiana and the Red Shirts in Mississippi and North and South Carolina. They terrorized blacks and Republicans, disrupting rallies, and suppressing voting.
In 1877, the era of Reconstruction ended. A deal was made with southern democratic leaders, which made Rutherford B. Hayes president in exchange for the withdrawal of federal troops from the South and putting an end to efforts to protect the civil rights of African Americans. The African American Timeline reveals the promise of Reconstruction, followed by its tragic undoing.
1879-1964: Jim Crow, the Civil Rights Movement, and Legal Victories
In 1879, thousands of African Americans refused to live under segregation in the South and migrated to Kansas. They became known as Exodusters. In the 1880s, African Americans in the South reached a peak of numbers in being elected and holding local offices, even while white Democrats were working to assert control at the state level. In 1881, Tennessee passed the first of the "Jim Crow" segregation laws, segregating state railroads. Similar laws were passed over the next 15 years throughout the Southern states. In 1884, Ida Wells sued the Chesapeake, Ohio & South Western Railroad Company for using segregated "Jim Crow" cars.
In 1890, Mississippi passed a new constitution that effectively disfranchised most blacks through voter registration and electoral requirements. In 1896, in Plessy v. Ferguson, racial segregation was ruled constitutional by the Supreme Court, ushering in the era of "Jim Crow" laws. In 1898, in Williams v. Mississippi, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld Mississippi’s constitution’s voter registration and election provisions, effectively disenfranchising blacks and poor whites.
In 1900, since the Civil War, 30,000 African-American teachers had been trained and put to work in the South. The majority of blacks had become literate. In 1909, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) was founded in New York by prominent black and white intellectuals.
In 1916, the Great Migration began, lasting until 1940, with approximately one and a half million African Americans moving from the Southern United States to the North and Midwest. In 1919, race riots occurred in Chicago, Washington, D.C.; Knoxville, Indianapolis, Omaha, and Arkansas. The 1920s saw the Harlem Renaissance, known as the "New Negro Movement."
In 1945, the Civil Rights Movement began. In 1946, in Morgan v. Virginia, the U.S. Supreme Court invalidated provisions of the Virginia Code that required the separation of white and colored passengers on interstate bus transport. In 1948, President Harry S. Truman issued Executive Order 9981, ordering the end of racial discrimination in the Armed Forces.
In 1950, in McLaurin v. Oklahoma State Regents, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that a public institution of higher learning could not treat a student differently because of his race. In Henderson v. the United States, the U.S. Supreme Court abolished segregation in railroad dining cars. In 1954, the Brown v. Board of Education case struck down segregation as unconstitutional.
In 1955, in Montgomery, Alabama, Rosa Parks was arrested for refusing to give up her seat on a public bus to a white man, sparking the Montgomery Bus Boycott. In 1956, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down segregation on buses nationwide. In 1957, Martin Luther King, Jr. and others set up the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), a leading engine of the Civil Rights Movement. President Dwight Eisenhower federalized the National Guard and ordered US Army troops to ensure the integration of Little Rock Central High School in Arkansas. President Eisenhower signed the Civil Rights Act of 1957.
In 1958, in Cooper v. Aaron, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that its decisions regarding integration bound all states. In 1960, non-violent sit-ins began at North Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, and Texas lunch counters. In Boynton v. Virginia, the U.S. Supreme Court held that racial segregation in bus terminals is illegal. In 1961, the Interstate Commerce Commission issued new rules ending discrimination in interstate travel.
In 1962, segregated transportation facilities were ruled unconstitutional by the U.S. Supreme Court. President Kennedy upheld the 1960 presidential campaign promise to eliminate housing segregation by signing an Executive Order banning segregation in Federally funded housing. In 1963, National Guardsmen integrated Birmingham, Alabama City Schools under orders from President Kennedy.
In 1964, the Civil Rights Act was signed, banning discrimination based on "race, color, religion, sex or national origin" in employment practices and public accommodations. The African American Timeline highlights the long and arduous struggle for civil rights.
1965-Present: Voting Rights, Continued Challenges, and Progress
In 1965, the Voting Rights Act was passed, outlawing the practices used in the South to disenfranchise African American voters. The Watts riots erupted in South Central Los Angeles, lasting over five days. In 1967, Edward W. Brooke became the first African American U.S. Senator since Reconstruction. Thurgood Marshall was the first African American appointed to the U.S. Supreme Court. The Detroit riot erupted in Detroit, Michigan, for five days.
In 1968, Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee. Shirley Chisholm became the first black female U.S. Representative.
In 2008, Barack Obama became the first African American to win the U.S. presidential race.
This African American Timeline, while comprehensive, is not exhaustive. It represents a selection of key moments in a history that is still unfolding. The ongoing struggle for racial justice and equality underscores the importance of understanding the past and continuing to work towards a more equitable future. As the African American Timeline illustrates, the journey towards true equality is a continuous process, demanding vigilance and a commitment to justice for all.
Also See:
- African American History
- African-Americans – From Slavery to Equality
- The Emancipation Proclamation & the 13th Amendment
- Slavery In the United States
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