Abolitionists agitate against Southern slavery and Northern racism.
Seeing their way of life continually under attack, Southern states angrily threaten to leave the Union. As slaveholders call for resumption of the Atlantic slave trade, abolitionists fight back against slavecatchers with sometimes fatal violence. Radical abolitionist John Brown's raid on the Federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry sends shockwaves through the nation. Walker's treatise calls for the immediate abolition of slavery. 1850 - The Compromise of 1850 allows California to enter the Union as a free state.