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1,000,000
  100,000
   10,000
     1,000

 "Homo"  [  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homo  ]

 Homo sapiens [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Early_modern_human ] 
300,000 year old specimen to current : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jebel_Irhoud
 https://humanorigins.si.edu/evidence/human-fossils/species/homo-sapiens
 When Lived: About 300,000 years ago to present

  Homo neanderthalensis  [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neanderthal ]
 ... lived in Eurasia until about 40,000 years ago.[9][10][11][12] 
 https://humanorigins.si.edu/evidence/human-fossils/species/homo-neanderthalensis 
  :: When Lived: About 400,000 - 40,000 years ago

 Homo erectus [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homo_erectus ] 
 earliest occurrence about 2 million years ago,[2] 
 https://humanorigins.si.edu/evidence/human-fossils/species/homo-erectus :: 
 When Lived: Between about 1.89 million and 110,000 years ago- and
-Homo ergaster [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homo_ergaster ]
 "...   Whether H. ergaster constitutes a species of its own or should be subsumed into H. erectus
 is an ongoing and unresolved dispute within palaeoanthropology.   ..." SOURCE: https://humanorigins.si.edu/evidence/human-fossils/species/homo-erectus "... Early African Homo erectus fossils (sometimes called Homo ergaster) ..."
 :: When Lived: Between about 1.89 million and 110,000

Homo heidelbergensis [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homo_heidelbergensis ] 
 https://humanorigins.si.edu/evidence/human-fossils/species/homo-heidelbergensis
: When Lived: About 700,000 to 200,000 years ago
 

 Homo naledi [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homo_naledi ] 335,000–236,000 years ago
 https://humanorigins.si.edu/evidence/human-fossils/species/homo-naledi
:: When Lived: 335,000 - 236,000 years ago

Homo habilis [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homo_habilis ]
https://humanorigins.si.edu/evidence/human-fossils/species/homo-habilis
::  When Lived: 2.4 million to 1.4 million years ago

Homo rudolfensis [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homo_rudolfensis]
 https://humanorigins.si.edu/evidence/human-fossils/species/homo-rudolfensis
:: When Lived: About 1.9 million to 1.8 million years ago

Kenyanthropus platyops [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenyanthropus ]
 https://humanorigins.si.edu/evidence/human-fossils/species/kenyanthropus-platyops
:: When Lived: About 3.5 million years ago "...  lived at the same time as Australopithecus afarensis,
Kenyanthropus’ molars were smaller, indicating that the two species may have had different diets
and therefore likely did not compete for the same types of food, though they were both probably largely plant eaters.

Australopithecus [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australopithecus ]
 "... the genus Homo emerged from an Australopithecus species[5][7][8][9][10] at some time between 3 and 2 million years ago.[11] ..."
"... Species include:  (  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Species - different species cannot inter-breed - they have reproductive barriers molecular level )

A. Australopithecus robustus, https://humanorigins.si.edu/evidence/human-fossils/species/paranthropus-robustus
[ When Lived: About 1.8 to 1.2 million years ago ]

A. Australopithecus boisei ,   https://humanorigins.si.edu/evidence/human-fossils/species/paranthropus-boisei
  P. boisei is usually thought to descend from earlier P. aethiopicus (who inhabited the same geographic area just a few hundred thousand years before) and lived alongside several other species of early humans during its 1.1 million year existence. P. boisei belongs to just one of the many side branches of human evolution, which most scientists agree includes all Paranthropus species and did not lead to H. sapiens.
https://humanorigins.si.edu/evidence/human-fossils/fossils/oh-5
  [ When Lived: About 2.3 to 1.2 million years ago ]

A. Australopithecus aethiopicus, ? https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/what-was-the-black-skull-32900408/
  https://humanorigins.si.edu/evidence/human-fossils/species/paranthropus-aethiopicus :: Paranthropus aethiopicus is still much of a mystery to paleoanthropologists, as very few remains of this species have been found. The discovery of the 2.5 million year old ’Black Skull’ in 1985 helped define this species as the earliest known robust australopithecine. P. aethiopicus has a strongly protruding face, large megadont teeth, a powerful jaw, and a well-developed sagittal crest on top of skull, indicating huge chewing muscles, with a strong emphasis on the muscles that connected toward the back of the crest and created strong chewing forces on the front teeth.
  Age: About 1.8 million years old

A. Australopithecus sediba,   https://humanorigins.si.edu/evidence/human-fossils/species/australopithecus-sediba 
 [ When Lived: Between 1.977 and 1.98 million years ago ]

A. Australopithecus africanus, https://humanorigins.si.edu/evidence/human-fossils/species/australopithecus-africanus
 [ When Lived: About 3.3 to 2.1 million years ago ]

A. Australopithecus garhi, https://humanorigins.si.edu/evidence/human-fossils/species/australopithecus-garhi 
 [ When Lived: About 2.5 million years ago ]
 

A. "Lucy" Australopithecus afarensis,  https://humanorigins.si.edu/evidence/human-fossils/species/australopithecus-afarensis
 [ When Lived: Between about 3.85 and 2.95 million years ]

A. Australopithecus bahrelghazali   https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/18305174/  
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australopithecus_bahrelghazali 
 [ When lived ... 3.5 Mya : https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/early-hominids-had-a-taste-for-grass-122066346/ ]

 A. Australopithecus deyiremeda    ..."  https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rstb.2015.0231  
 ( https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-32906836 ) 
https://www.cmnh.org/science-news/press-room/press-releases/australopithecus-deyiremeda
 [ When Lived : 3.5 Myr hominin cranium ]

A. Australopithecus anamensis,  https://humanorigins.si.edu/evidence/human-fossils/species/australopithecus-anamensis
 Australopithecus anamensis has a combination of traits found in both apes and humans. The upper end of the tibia (shin bone) shows an expanded area of bone and a human-like orientation of the ankle joint, indicative of regular bipedal walking (support of body weight on one leg at the time). Long forearms and features of the wrist bones suggest these individuals probably climbed trees as well. The cranium combines some more ancestral features, such as a protruding face and a long and narrow braincase, with some more derived features, such as forwardly projecting cheekbones similar to Paranthropus.
 [ When Lived: About 4.2 to 3.8 million years ago ]  
 

  ? "Australopithecus ardipithecus-ramidus    https://humanorigins.si.edu/evidence/human-fossils/species/ardipithecus-ramidus
 - Over 100 specimens of Ardipithecus ramidus have been recovered in Ethiopia.  Even though it has some ape-like features (as do many other early human species), it also has key human features including smaller diamond-shaped canines and some evidence of upright walking. It may have descended from an earlier species of Ardipithecus that has been found in the same area of Ethiopia, Ardipithecus kadabba.   [ When Lived: About 4.2 to 3.8 million years ago ]

    - Second SOURCE: https://evolution-outreach.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1007/s12052-010-0247-8  

[ END]

 American History :: 

 SOURCE: America : [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States ]
   (  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States#History )
 

 FIRST AMERICANS

"...  The mainstream view of the peopling of the Americas, also known as the "short chronology theory", is that the first movement beyond Alaska into the New World occurred no earlier than 15,000 – 17,000 years ago, followed by successive waves of immigrants.[13][14] Pedra Furada provides potential evidence for the proponents of the "long chronology theory", which states that the first group of people entered the hemisphere at a much earlier date, possibly 21,000–40,000 years ago,[15][16] with a much later mass secondary wave of immigrants.[17][18] -- This evidence is considered controversial and not widely accepted by experts in the field.[19][20] A caribou bone used as a scraper, found at the Old Crow Flats site in Canada and thought to be 27,000 years old, in the 1970s was used to support the long chronology theory. A re-dating, with more modern techniques in the 1990s came up with an age of 2,000 years.[21]  ..."

 13 Service NOT available
 14 BOOK unavailable (  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pedra_Furada )
 15 https://web.archive.org/web/20110424103401/http://www.pc.gc.ca/eng/docs/r/pfa-fap/sec1.aspx [ Archaeological ResourceS in Canada? ]
 16 https://web.archive.org/web/20081022085345/http://yukon.taiga.net/vuntutrda/archaeol/info.htm
 17 http://atlasofthehumanjourney.com/ > "Atlas of the Human Journey". National Geographic "
 18 http://www.bradshawfoundation.com/journey/
 19 http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/1521376/Pedra-Furada
 20 http://www.sfu.museum/journey/an-en/postsecondaire-postsecondary/pedra_furada
 21 https://web.archive.org/web/20131106155940/http://www.tc.gov.yk.ca/publications/ice_age_old_crow.pdf

 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States#History

 Indigenous peoples and pre-Columbian history
- It has been generally accepted that the first inhabitants of North America migrated from Siberia by way of the Bering land bridge and arrived at least 12,000 years ago; however, some evidence suggests an even earlier date of arrival - for "first inhabitants".[34][35][36] 
    
34 >  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States#CITEREFErlandsonRickVellanoweth2008
   [ https://books.google.com/books?id=GeTv2lmb79UC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false ]
35 >  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States#CITEREFSavage2011 
   [  https://books.google.com/books?id=9KT3lI76-0cC ]
36 >  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States#CITEREFHavilandWalrathPrins2013
  [ https://books.google.com/books?id=9_qGhW338KQC&pg=PA219 ]

 [ SOURCE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clovis_culture "... The Clovis culture is a prehistoric Paleoamerican culture, named for distinct stone tools found in close association with Pleistocene fauna at Blackwater Locality No. 1 near Clovis, New Mexico, in the 1920s and 1930s. It appears around 11,500–11,000 uncalibrated RCYBP[1] at the end of the last glacial period and is characterized by the manufacture of "Clovis points" and distinctive bone and ivory tools. Archaeologists' most precise determinations at present suggest this radiocarbon age is equal to roughly [ 13,200 to 12,900 calendar years ago ]. 

 ...Clovis people are considered to be the ancestors of most of the indigenous peoples of the Americas.[2][3][4] -- The only human burial that has been directly associated with tools from the Clovis culture included the remains of an infant boy researchers named "Anzick"-1.[5][6] Paleogenetic analyses of Anzick-1's ancient nuclear, mitochondrial, and Y-chromosome DNA[7] reveal that  ... Anzick-1 is closely related to modern Native American populations, which lends support to the Beringia hypothesis for the settlement of the Americas.[8] -- 

 The "Clovis culture" was replaced by several more localized regional societies from the Younger Dryas cold-climate period onward. [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Younger_Dryas ]

 Post-Clovis cultures include: 
the Folsom tradition, [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Folsom_tradition ]
Gainey,  [ https://www.jstor.org/stable/40914243 ] 
Suwannee-Simpson,  [ https://www.researchgate.net/publication/263925103_PIDBA_Paleoindian_Database_of_the_Americas_2010_Current_Status_and_Findings#pf11 ]
Plainview-Goshen, [ https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Map-showing-the-known-distribution-of-Goshen-Folsom-and-Goshen-Plainview-Goshen-sites_fig1_268027931 ]
Cumberland, [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cumberland_point ] 
and Redstone.  [ https://scholarcommons.sc.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1003&context=sciaa_staffpub ] 
 
( Each of these [above] is thought to derive directly from Clovis), in some cases apparently differing only in the length of the fluting on their projectile points. Although this is generally held to be the result of normal cultural change through time,[9] numerous other reasons have been suggested as driving forces to explain changes in the archaeological record, such as the "Younger Dryas postglacial climate change"  [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Younger_Dryas ] , which exhibited numerous faunal extinctions.

-- After the discovery of several Clovis sites in eastern North America in the 1930s, the "Clovis people" came to be regarded as the first human inhabitants who created a widespread culture in the Americas. 

 However, several archaeological discoveries have cast significant doubt on the "Clovis-first" theory, including sites such as
A) Cactus Hill in Virginia,
B)Paisley Caves in the Summer Lake Basin of Oregon,
C) the Topper site in Allendale County South Carolina,
D) Meadowcroft Rockshelter in Pennsylvania,
E) the Friedkin[10] site in Texas,
F)Cueva Fell in Chile,
and especially G)Monte Verde also in Chile.[11] 

The oldest claimed human archaeological site in the Americas is the Pedra Furada hearths in Brazil, controversially dated to 19,000 to 30,000 years before the earliest Clovis sites.[12][13][14]  ..." ] 

11
12
13
14

... 
A)  Cactus Hill in Virginia, [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cactus_Hill ] (  inhabited 16,000 to 20,000 years ago 
B)   Paisley Caves in the Summer Lake Basin of Oregon,  [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paisley_Caves ]  ( The DNA, radiocarbon dated to 14,300 years ago, )
C)  the Topper site in Allendale County South Carolina, [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Topper_Site ] < ( dating disputed )
D)  Meadowcroft Rockshelter in Pennsylvania, [  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meadowcroft_Rockshelter  ] ( the area may have been continually inhabited for more than 19,000 years. )
E)  the Friedkin[10] site in Texas, [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buttermilk_Creek_Complex ] (  occupation is supported by numerous lines of evidence including optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) dates ranging from 13,200-15,500 before present,  ) 
F)  Cueva Fell in Chile,  [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cueva_Fell ] ( Several hearths were also excavated from this level which produced three radiocarbon dates between c.11,000 and 10,000 years BP.[7] )
G)  and especially Monte Verde also in Chile.[11] [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monte_Verde ] ( has been dated to as early as 18,500 cal BP (16,500 BC + 2).[1] )
The oldest claimed human archaeological site in the Americas is the 
 Pedra Furada hearths in Brazil [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pedra_Furada ], ( tools found at the location were dated from 48,000 to 32,000 years before present,  Piauí, Brazil ) [WHICH MEANS n. AMERICA COULD HAVE BEEN POPULATED FROM SOUTH AMERICA. ]
 Google MAP: https://www.google.com/maps/place/Serra+da+Capivara+National+Park/@-8.662583,-42.6784482,11z/data=!3m1!4b1!4m5!3m4!1s0x779d70f30299457:0x63d343eb51fea88f!8m2!3d-8.6952778!4d-42.5862674 [ Serra da Capivara National Park ]

...

 The Clovis culture, which appeared around 11,000 BC, is believed to represent the "first wave" [of three waves] of human settlement of the Americas.[37][38]  This was likely the first of three major waves of migration into North America; "later waves: brought the ancestors of present-day a, b, c
 
a: Athabaskans, [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Athabaskan_languages ]

b: Aleuts, [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aleut ] 
and  c: Eskimos.[39]  [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eskimo - "Inuit and Yupik" ]  
 SOURCE: https://www.uaf.edu/anlc/resources/inuit_or_eskimo.php
 "...  Although the name "Eskimo" was commonly used in Alaska to refer to Inuit and Yupik people of the world, this usage is now considered unacceptable by many or even most Alaska Natives, largely since it is a colonial name imposed by non-Indigenous people. Alaska Natives increasingly prefer to be known by the names they use in their own languages, such as Inupiaq or Yupik. "Inuit" is now the current term in Alaska and across the Arctic, and "Eskimo" is fading from use. The Inuit Circumpolar Council prefers the term "Inuit" but some other organizations use "Eskimo".  ..." [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inuit_Circumpolar_Council ] 

Over time, indigenous cultures in North America grew increasingly complex, and some, such as the pre-Columbian Mississippian culture in the southeast, developed advanced agriculture, architecture, and complex societies.[40] The city-state of Cahokia is the largest, most complex pre-Columbian archaeological site in the modern-day United States.[41] 

In the Four Corners region, Ancestral Puebloan culture developed from centuries of agricultural experimentation.[42] The Haudenosaunee, located in the southern Great Lakes region, was established - at some point between the twelfth and fifteenth centuries.[43] Most prominent along the Atlantic coast were the Algonquian tribes, who practiced hunting and trapping, along with limited cultivation.  

:::::: Estimating the native population of North America at the time of European contact is difficult.[44][45] Douglas H. Ubelaker of the Smithsonian Institution estimated that there was a population of 92,916 in the south Atlantic states and a population of 473,616 in the Gulf states,[46] but most academics regard this figure as too low.[44] 

Anthropologist Henry F. Dobyns believed the populations were much higher, suggesting around 1.1 million along the shores of the Gulf of Mexico, 2.2 million people living between Florida and Massachusetts, 5.2 million in the Mississippi Valley and tributaries, and around 700,000 people in the Florida peninsula.[44][45]

source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States#History

 European settlements

 - Claims of very early colonization of coastal New England by the Norse are disputed and controversial. 
   [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norse :  "... Norse is a demonym for Norsemen, a medieval North Germanic ethnolinguistic group ancestral to modern Scandinavians, defined as speakers of Old Norse from about the 9th to the 13th centuries.  ..." ] 

The first documented arrival of Europeans in the continental United States is that of Spanish conquistadors such as Juan Ponce de León, who made his first expedition to Florida in 1513. 

::: Even earlier, Christopher Columbus had landed in Puerto Rico on his 1493 voyage, and San Juan was settled by the Spanish a decade later.[47] 

The Spanish set up the first settlements in Florida and New Mexico, such as Saint Augustine, often considered [America's] the nation's oldest city,[48] and Santa Fe. 

The French established their own settlements along the Mississippi River, notably New Orleans.[49] 

Successful English settlement of the eastern coast of North America began with the Virginia Colony in 1607 at Jamestown and with the Pilgrims' colony at Plymouth in 1620.[50][51]
 
The continent's first elected legislative assembly, Virginia's House of Burgesses, was founded in 1619. Documents such as the Mayflower Compact and the Fundamental Orders of Connecticut established precedents for representative self-government and constitutionalism that would develop throughout the American colonies.[52][53] 

Many settlers were dissenting Christians who came (to America) seeking "religious freedom". 

In 1784, the Russians were the first Europeans to establish a settlement in Alaska, at Three Saints Bay. 

Russian America once spanned much of the present-day state of Alaska.[54] 

:: In the early days of colonization, many European settlers were subject to food shortages, disease, and attacks from Native Americans. 

source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States#History

Native Americans were also often at war with neighboring tribes and European settlers. In many cases, however, the natives and settlers came to depend on one another. Settlers traded for food and animal pelts; natives for guns, tools and other European goods.[55]  Natives taught many settlers to cultivate corn, beans, and other foodstuffs. 

European missionaries and others felt it was important to "civilize" the Native Americans and urged them to adopt European agricultural practices and lifestyles.[56][57] 

However, with the increased European colonization of North America, the Native Americans were displaced and often killed.[58] The native population of America declined after European arrival for various reasons,[59][60][61] primarily diseases such as smallpox and measles.[62][63]

source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States#History

 <The original Thirteen Colonies (shown in DARK PINK) in 1775
(image :  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Map_of_territorial_growth_1775.svg ) 

African slaves into Colonial America 

-- European settlers also began trafficking of African slaves into Colonial America via the transatlantic slave trade.[64] 
(  https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.2307/2713432  )  "First Slave" - African - in America < gOOGLE
 

 1641 ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massachusetts_Body_of_Liberties )

 SOURCE: "...  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavery_in_the_United_States#:~:text=In%201654%2C%20John%20Casor%2C%20a,slave%20in%20a%20civil%20case.  ...
 "... In 1641, Massachusetts became the first colony to authorize slavery through enacted law.^[27] Massachusetts passed the Body of Liberties, which prohibited slavery in many instances but allowed people to be enslaved if they were captives of war, if they sold themselves into slavery or were purchased elsewhere, or if they were sentenced to slavery as punishment by the governing authority.^[27] The Body of Liberties used the word "strangers" to refer to people bought and sold as slaves; they were generally not English subjects. Colonists came to equate this term with Native Americans and Africans.^[28]

In 1654, John Casor, a black indentured servant in colonial Virginia, was the first man to be declared a slave in a civil case. He had claimed to an officer that his master, Anthony Johnson, had held him past his indenture term. Johnson himself was a free black, who had arrived in Virginia in 1621 from Angola. A neighbor, Robert Parker, told Johnson that if he did not release Casor, he would testify in court to this fact. Under local laws, Johnson was at risk for losing some of his headright lands for violating the terms of indenture. Under duress, Johnson freed Casor. Casor entered into a seven years' indenture with Parker. Feeling cheated, Johnson sued Parker to repossess Casor. A Northampton County, Virginia court ruled for Johnson, declaring that Parker illegally was detaining Casor from his rightful master who legally held him "for the duration of his life".^[29]  ..."

[ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavery_in_the_United_States ]
 

"... Because of a lower prevalence of tropical diseases and better treatment, slaves had a much higher life expectancy in North America than in South America, leading to a rapid increase in their numbers.[65][66] ... Colonial society was largely divided over the religious and moral implications of slavery, and several colonies passed acts both against and in favor of the practice.[67][68] 

European indentured servants > ( SOURCE: https://ldhi.library.cofc.edu/exhibits/show/africanpassageslowcountryadapt/introductionatlanticworld/new-world-labor-systems--europ "...  Until the early eighteenth century, the majority of Europeans who came to the Americas were not free settlers or elite landholders. They were indentured servants. In exchange for the cost of ship passage across the Atlantic, men and women from throughout Western Europe came to the Americas to work in a range of labor roles, from skilled trades to plantation agriculture. To pay for the cost of their travel, indentured servants worked for several years for a contract holder who did not pay wages, but did provide housing, food, and clothing.

Similar to enslaved American Indians and Africans, indentured servants could have their contracts sold at market to different bidders, could be physically punished, and in some contexts, servants were not allowed to marry or have children without the permission of their contract holder. Labor and disease conditions for early colonial indentured servants were also brutal, and many died before the end of their contract. Attempting to flee their servitude could lead to punishment and added years to their contract. In addition, while many indentured servants came willingly to the Americas due to periods of low wages and poor living conditions in Western Europe, significant numbers were also kidnapped, or transported as convict labor

  ...")

However, by the turn of the 18th century (1799) , African slaves had supplanted European indentured servants as cash crop labor, especially in the American South.[69]

 source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States#History

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Map_of_territorial_growth_1775.svg

- The Thirteen Colonies:
1. New Hampshire, [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Hampshire ]
2. Massachusetts, [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massachusetts ]
3. Connecticut, [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Connecticut ]
4. Rhode Island, [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhode_Island ]
5. New York, [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_(state) ]
6. New Jersey, [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Jersey ]
7. Pennsylvania, [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pennsylvania ]
8. Delaware, [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delaware ] 
9. Maryland, [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maryland ]
10. Virginia, [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virginia ]
11. North Carolina, [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Carolina ]
12. South Carolina,  [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Carolina ]
and 13. Georgia [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgia_(U.S._state) ]

- that would become the "United States of America" - were "administered" by the British - as overseas dependencies.[70] 

[HOWEVER THE COLONIES] - had "local governments" with elections open to most free [white] men.[71] 

source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States#History

With extremely high birth rates, low death rates, and steady settlement, the colonial population grew rapidly, eclipsing Native American populations.[72] 

The Christian revivalist movement of the 1730s and 1740s known as the "Great Awakening" fueled interest both in religion and in religious liberty.[73]  [  https://www.history.com/topics/british-history/great-awakening ]

-- During the "Seven Years War" (1756–1763), known in the U.S. as the "French and Indian War", British forces captured Canada from the French. With the creation of the Province of Quebec, Canada's "francophone" [ "French speaking" - https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/francophone ] population would remain isolated from the English-speaking colonial dependencies of Nova Scotia, Newfoundland and the Thirteen Colonies. Excluding the Native Americans who lived there, the Thirteen Colonies had a population of over 2.1 million in 1770, about a third that of Britain. 
 
Despite continuing new arrivals, the rate of natural increase was such that - by the 1770s - only a small minority of "Americans" had been born overseas.[74] ... The colonies' distance from Britain had allowed the development of "self-government", but their unprecedented success motivated British monarchs to periodically seek to reassert "royal authority".[75]

  source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States#History

Independence and expansion
 

HHHHHHHH 

 > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Declaration_of_Independence_(1819),_by_John_Trumbull.jpg
 Declaration of Independence, painting by John Trumbull, depicts the "Committee of Five" presenting their draft of the Declaration to the Continental Congress, July 4, 1776: The members of this group were:

• John Adams, representative of Massachusetts, who later became the second president^[1]
• Thomas Jefferson, representative of Virginia, who later became the third president^[2]
• Benjamin Franklin, representative of Pennsylvania, known as one of the most famous intellectuals of the Founding Fathers, whose academic writings and press publications had a very significant influence in the American Revolution
• Roger Sherman, representative of Connecticut, the only person to sign all four of the U.S. state papers: the Continental Association, the Declaration, the Articles of Confederation, and the Constitution^[3]
• Robert Livingston, representative of New York, who later negotiated the Louisiana Purchase as the minister to France.^[4]

The American Revolutionary War - fought by the Thirteen Colonies against the British Empire.  (circa 1776) . 

Americans had developed an ideology of "republicanism", asserting that government rested on the will of the people as expressed in their "local" legislatures.  [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Republicanism_in_the_United_States ] 

They [ the "Americans" ]  demanded their "rights as Englishmen" and "no taxation without representation". 

The British insisted on "administering" the empire through Parliament, and the conflict escalated into war.[76]

The Second Continental Congress unanimously adopted the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776; this day is celebrated annually as Independence Day.[77] 
 In 1777, the "Articles of Confederation" established a decentralized government - that operated until 1789.[77]
 America's Constitution was produced in 1787* - and, "ratified" - by the various states in the ensuing years. With 27 amendments added over two hundred and five years : [ https://www.senate.gov/civics/constitution_item/constitution.htm ]

After its defeat at the Siege of Yorktown in 1781, Britain signed a peace treaty. American sovereignty became internationally recognized, and the country was granted all lands east of the Mississippi River. 

Tensions with Britain remained, however, leading to the War of 1812, which was fought to a draw.[78] 

Nationalists led the Philadelphia Convention of 1787* in writing the United States Constitution, ratified in state conventions in 1788. Going into force in 1789, this "constitution" reorganized the federal government into three branches, on the principle of creating salutary checks and balances. [ https://www.senate.gov/civics/constitution_item/constitution.htm ] 

George Washington, who had led the Continental Army to victory, was the first president elected under the new constitution. 

 source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States#History 

The Bill of Rights (the first ten "Amendments", forbidding federal restriction of personal freedoms and guaranteeing a range of legal protections, was adopted in 1791.[79]  [ https://www.senate.gov/civics/constitution_item/constitution.htm ]

 ( Territorial acquisitions of the United States between 1783 and 1917 )  

--  Although the American "federal government" outlawed American participation in the Atlantic slave trade in 1807, after 1820, cultivation of the highly profitable cotton crop exploded in the Deep South, and along with it, the slave population.[80][81][82] That is, the laws  - were NOT enforced.

The Second Great Awakening, especially in the period 1800–1840, converted millions (of Americans) to evangelical Protestantism. 
 [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Great_Awakening ]

In the North, it ( Second Great Awakening) energized multiple social reform movements, including abolitionism;[83] in the South, Methodists and Baptists proselytized among slave populations.[84]

 source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States#History

 Westward Expansion Beginning in the late 18th century (CIRCA 1785), American settlers began to expand westward,[85] prompting a long series of

American Indian Wars.[86] [ en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Indian_Wars ]

The 1803 Louisiana Purchase almost doubled the nation's area,[87] Spain ceded Florida and other Gulf Coast territory in 1819.[88] 

The Republic of Texas was annexed ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Republic_of_Texas )  in 1845 during a period of expansionism.[89] 

The 1846 Oregon Treaty with Britain led to U.S. control of the present-day American Northwest.[90] 
  [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oregon_Treaty ]

 Mexican–American War
Victory in the Mexican–American War resulted in the 1848 Mexican Cession of California and much of the present-day American Southwest, making the U.S. span the continent.[85][91] [ https://www.history.com/topics/mexican-american-war/treaty-of-guadalupe-hidalgo ]

"Manifest Destiny" [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manifest_destiny ]

The California Gold Rush of 1848–1849 spurred migration to the Pacific coast, which led to the California Genocide
  ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_genocide ) [92] and the creation of additional western states.[93] 

  Homestead Acts ( (1862)   The "giving away" of vast quantities of land to white European settlers as part of the Homestead Acts, nearly 10% of the total area of the United States, and to private railroad companies and colleges - as part of land grants spurred economic development.[94]  [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homestead_Acts ]

Virginia Military District ( 1870 ) : "...  The Virginia Military District was an approximately 4.2 million acre (17,000 km²) area of land in what is now the state of Ohio that was reserved by Virginia to use as payment in lieu of cash for its veterans of the American Revolutionary War. Virginia had historic claims to much of the Northwest Territory, which included Ohio, dating from its colonial charter. Virginia and the other states ceded their claims over western lands to overcome other states' objections to ratifying the Articles of Confederation. In return for ceding its claims in 1784, Virginia was granted this area to provide "military bounty" land grants. The Ohio district was a surplus reserve, in that military land grants were first made in an area southeast of the Ohio River, in what is now Kentucky. The Ohio land was to be used only after the land southeast of the river was exhausted. ..." [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virginia_Military_District ] < Franklin County, Ohio.

source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States#History

US Civil War (1861 - 1865 ) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Civil_War 

 American Railroads ( 1829 + )   [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rail_transportation_in_the_United_States ] 

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_Railroad_Acts [1862 ]  [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rail_transportation_in_the_United_States ]

After the Civil War, new "transcontinental railways" [ First ]  made relocation easier for settlers, expanded internal trade, and increased conflicts with Native Americans.[95]  [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rail_transportation_in_the_United_States ]

In 1869, a new Peace Policy nominally promised to protect Native Americans  from abuses, avoid further war, and secure their eventual U.S. citizenship.      Nonetheless, large-scale conflicts continued throughout the West into the 1900s. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Native_American_policy_of_the_Ulysses_S._Grant_administration  - 1869 ]

 
( Civil War and Reconstruction era )  

 source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States#History

The Battle of Gettysburg, fought between Union and Confederate forces on July 1–3, 1863, around the town of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, marked a turning point in the American Civil War. -- Irreconcilable sectional conflict regarding the enslavement of Africans and African Americans ultimately led to the American Civil War.[96] With the 1860 election of Republican Abraham Lincoln, conventions in thirteen "slave states" declared secession and formed the Confederate States of America (the "South" or the "Confederacy"), while the federal government (the "Union" STATES) maintained that secession was illegal.[97] 

In order to bring about this "secession", military action was initiated by the secessionists, and the Union responded in kind. The ensuing war would become the deadliest military conflict in American history, resulting in the deaths of approximately 618,000 soldiers as well as many civilians.[98] ( The Union initially simply fought to keep the country united. )  As casualties mounted - after 1863 - Lincoln delivered his "Emancipation Proclamation" .
"... President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation on January 1, 1863, as the nation approached its third year of bloody civil war. The proclamation declared "that all persons held as slaves" within the rebellious states "are, and henceforward shall be free."  ..." With this, the main purpose of the war - from the Union's viewpoint became - the abolition of slavery. Indeed, when the Union ultimately won the war in April 1865, each of the states in the defeated South was required to ratify the Thirteenth Amendment, which prohibited slavery - except as penal labor. Two other amendments were also ratified, ensuring citizenship for blacks and, at least in theory, voting rights for them as well.

 ( Reconstruction began in earnest following the war. )  While President Lincoln attempted to foster friendship and forgiveness between the Union and the former Confederacy, his assassination on April 14, 1865 drove a wedge between North and South again. 

[ Abraham Lincoln was a prominent - and MODERATE - member of the Republican Party. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Republican_Party_(United_States) 

 ( Republicans - in the federal government (of 1865) - made it their goal to oversee the rebuilding of the South and to ensure the rights of African Americans. ) 

 Since Andrew Johnson was such a "collossal failure" - and against everything [that Lincoln stood for] - Many Americans ask> Why did "Abraham Lincoln" select "Andrew Johnson to be his "running Mate" and vice-president - for his re-election of 1964?  THE ANSWER IS "POLITICS!" - AND THE ELECTION OF 1864. [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abraham_Lincoln : SOURCE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1864_United_States_presidential_election Mr. Lincoln did not "select" Andrew Johnson (the 1864 convention delegates did. )

 https://archive.org/stream/lincolnscooperin00baro/lincolnscooperin00baro_djvu.txt 

 Lincoln "Cooper Union" Speech :  http://www.abrahamlincolnonline.org/lincoln/speeches/cooper.htm 

 "...  The speech electrified Lincoln's listeners and gained him important political support in Seward's home territory. Said a New York writer, "No man ever before made such an impression on his first appeal to a New York audience." After being printed by New York newspapers, the speech was widely circulated as campaign literature.

Easily one of Lincoln's best efforts, it revealed his singular mastery of ideas and issues in a way that justified loyal support. Here we can see him pursuing facts, forming them into meaningful patterns, pressing relentlessly toward his conclusion.

With a deft touch, Lincoln exposed the roots of sectional strife and the inconsistent positions of Senator Stephen Douglas and Chief Justice Roger Taney.
... [Lincoln]  urged fellow Republicans not to capitulate to "Southern demands" to recognize slavery as being right, but to "stand by our duty, fearlessly and effectively."

 QUESTION: DOES THE "FEDERAL GOVERNMENT" - AS CREATED BY THE US CONSTITUTION [OF 1787]  - ENJOY THE POWER TO DICTATE POLICY - ON "SLAVERY"? 
  " Popular sovereignty in the United States "
 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Popular_sovereignty_in_the_United_States#Regarding_slavery

THE SPEECH :

  [ LINCOLN]  Mr. President ( OF THE YOUNG REPUBLICANS UNION ) and fellow citizens of New York: -

The facts with which I shall deal this evening are mainly old and familiar; nor is there anything new in the general use I shall make of them. If there shall be any novelty, it will be in the mode of presenting the facts, and the inferences and observations following that presentation.

 ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_A._Douglas )

In his speech last autumn, at Columbus, Ohio, as reported in "The New-York Times," Senator Douglas said:

"Our fathers, when they framed the Government under which we live, understood this question just as well, and even better, than we do now." 

 I fully indorse this, and I adopt it as a text for this discourse. I so adopt it because it furnishes a precise and an agreed starting point for a discussion between Republicans and that wing of the Democracy headed by Senator Douglas. It simply leaves the inquiry:
 "What was the understanding those fathers had of the question mentioned?"

What is the frame of government under which we live?

The answer must be: "The Constitution of the United States." That Constitution consists of the original, framed in 1787, (and under which the present government first went into operation,) and twelve subsequently framed amendments, the first ten of which were framed in 1789.

Who were our "fathers" that framed the Constitution? I suppose the "thirty-nine" who signed the original instrument may be fairly called our fathers who framed that part of the present Government. It is almost exactly true to say they "framed it", and it is altogether true to say they fairly represented the opinion and sentiment of the whole nation at that time. Their names, being familiar to nearly all, and accessible to quite all, need not now be repeated.

I take these "thirty-nine," for the present, as being "our fathers who framed the Government under which we live."

What is the question which, according to the text, those fathers understood "just as well, and even better than we do now?"

It is this: Does the proper division of "local" from "federal" authority, or anything in the Constitution, forbid our Federal Government to control - as to slavery - in our Federal Territories? ( MAP )

Upon this, Senator Douglas [a "Democrat" - prior to the 1860 "party split]  holds the affirmative [YES], and Republicans the negative [NO]. This affirmation and denial form an issue; and this issue - this question - is precisely what the text declares our fathers understood "better than we."

Let us now inquire whether the "thirty-nine," or any of them, ever acted upon this question; and if they did, how they acted upon it - how they expressed that "better understanding"?

In 1784, three years before the Constitution - the United States then owning the "Northwestern Territory", and no other, the Congress of "the Confederation" had before them the question of prohibiting slavery in that Territory; and four of the "thirty-nine" who - afterward - framed the Constitution, were in that Congress, and voted on that question.
Of these, Roger Sherman, Thomas Mifflin, and Hugh Williamson voted for the prohibition, thus showing that, in their understanding, no line dividing "local" from "federal" authority, nor anything else, properly forbade the Federal Government to control as to slavery in federal territory. The other of the four - James M'Henry - voted against the prohibition, showing that, for some cause, he thought it improper to vote for it.

In 1787, still before the Constitution (of September 1787 ) , but while the Convention was in session framing it, and while the Northwestern Territory (still) was the only territory "owned" by the United States, the same question of "prohibiting slavery" in the territory again came before the Congress of the Confederation; and two more of the "thirty-nine" who afterward signed the Constitution, were in that Congress, and voted on the question. They were William Blount and William Few; and they both voted for the prohibition - thus showing that, in their understanding, no line dividing local from federal authority, nor anything else, properly forbids the Federal Government to control as to slavery in Federal territory.

 This time the "prohibition" became a law, being part of what is now well known as the Ordinance of '87.

  (image)  [ https://www.loc.gov/item/90898154/ ]

The question of "federal control of slavery in the territories", seems not to have been directly before the Convention which framed the original Constitution (of September 1787); and hence it is not recorded that the "thirty-nine," or any of them, while engaged on that instrument, expressed any opinion on that precise question.

In 1789, by the first Congress which sat under the Constitution, an act was passed to enforce the "Ordinance of '87", including the prohibition of slavery in the Northwestern Territory. The bill for this act was reported by one of the "thirty-nine," Thomas Fitzsimmons, then a member of the House of Representatives from Pennsylvania. It went through all its stages without a word of opposition, and finally passed both branches without yeas and nays, which is equivalent to a unanimous passage.

 [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1st_United_States_Congress ] 

 [ NORTHWEST TERRITORY: https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/United_States_Statutes_at_Large/Volume_1/1st_Congress/1st_Session/Chapter_8 (SEE ART VI) ]

In this Congress there were sixteen of the thirty-nine fathers who framed the original Constitution. They were John Langdon, Nicholas Gilman, Wm. S. Johnson, Roger Sherman, Robert Morris, Thos. Fitzsimmons, William Few, Abraham Baldwin, Rufus King, William Paterson, George Clymer, Richard Bassett, George Read, Pierce Butler, Daniel Carroll, James Madison.

This shows that, in their understanding, no line dividing "local" from "federal" authority, nor anything in the Constitution, properly forbade Congress to prohibit slavery in the federal territory; else both their fidelity to correct principle, and their oath to support the Constitution, would have constrained them to oppose the prohibition.

Again, George Washington, another of the "thirty-nine," was then President of the United States, and, as such approved and signed the bill; thus completing its validity as a law, and thus showing that, in his understanding, no line dividing local from federal authority, nor anything in the Constitution, forbade the Federal Government, to control as to slavery in federal territory.

No great while after the adoption of the original Constitution, North Carolina "ceded" to the Federal Government the country now constituting the State of Tennessee; and a few years later Georgia "ceded" that which now constitutes the States of Mississippi and Alabama.

In both deeds of cession it was made a condition - by the ceding "States" - [that] the "Federal Government" should not prohibit slavery in the ceded territory. [ Besides this, slavery was then actually in the ceded country. ] Under these circumstances, Congress, on taking charge of these countries, did not absolutely prohibit slavery within them.

But,  they did "interfere with it" - take control of it - even there, to a certain extent.

In 1798, Congress organized the Territory of Mississippi. In the act of organization, they prohibited the bringing of slaves into the Territory, from any place without the United States, by fine, and giving freedom to slaves so bought. This act passed both branches of Congress without yeas and nays. In that Congress were three of the "thirty-nine" who framed the original Constitution. They were John Langdon, George Read and Abraham Baldwin. They all, probably, voted for it. Certainly they would have placed their opposition to it upon record, if, in their understanding, any line dividing local from federal authority, or anything in the Constitution, properly forbade the Federal Government to "control" - as to slavery - in federal territory.

In 1803, the Federal Government purchased the Louisiana country. Our former territorial acquisitions came from certain of our own States; but this "Louisiana country" was acquired from a foreign nation. In 1804, Congress gave a territorial organization to that part of it which now constitutes the State of Louisiana. New Orleans, lying within that part, was an old and comparatively large city. There were other considerable towns and settlements, and slavery was extensively and thoroughly intermingled with the people.

Congress did not, in the "Territorial Act", prohibit slavery; but they did "interfere with it" - "take control of it" - in a more marked and extensive way than they did in the case of Mississippi.

The substance of the provision therein made, in relation to slaves, was:

  First. That no slave should be imported into the territory from foreign parts.

 Second. That no slave should be carried into it who had been imported into the United States since the first day of May, 1798.

 Third. That no slave should be carried into it, except by the owner, and for his own use as a settler;

 - the penalty in all the cases being a fine upon the violator of the law, and freedom to the slave.

This act also was passed without yeas and nays. In the Congress which passed it, there were two of the "thirty-nine." They were Abraham Baldwin and Jonathan Dayton. As stated in the case of Mississippi, it is probable they both voted for it. They would not have allowed it to pass without recording their opposition to it, if, in their understanding, it violated either the line properly dividing local from federal authority, or any provision of the Constitution.

In 1819-20, came and passed the Missouri question.
  ( https://www.presidentprofiles.com/Washington-Johnson/James-Monroe-The-missouri-question.html )

 Many votes were taken, by yeas and nays, in both branches of Congress, upon the various phases of the general question. Two of the "thirty-nine" - Rufus King and Charles Pinckney - were members of that Congress.

Mr. King steadily voted for slavery prohibition and against all compromises;
  While Mr. Pinckney as steadily voted against slavery prohibition and against all compromises.

By this, Mr. King showed that, in his understanding, no line dividing local from federal authority, nor anything in the Constitution, was violated by Congress prohibiting slavery in federal territory; while Mr. Pinckney, by his votes, showed that, in his understanding, there was some sufficient reason for opposing such prohibition in that case.

The cases I have mentioned [ABOVE] are the only acts of the "thirty-nine," or of any of them, upon the direct issue, which I have been able to discover.

To enumerate the persons who thus acted, as being four in 1784, two in 1787, seventeen in 1789, three in 1798, two in 1804, and two in 1819-20 - there would be thirty of them. But, this would be counting John Langdon, Roger Sherman, William Few, Rufus King, and George Read each twice, and Abraham Baldwin, three times. The true number of those of the "thirty-nine" whom I have shown to have acted upon the question, which, by the text, they understood better than we, is twenty-three, leaving sixteen not shown to have acted upon it in any way.

Here, then, we have twenty-three out of our thirty-nine fathers "who framed the government under which we live," who have, upon their official responsibility and their corporal oaths, acted upon the very question which the text affirms they "understood just as well, and even better than we do now;" and twenty-one of them - a clear majority of the whole "thirty-nine" - so acting upon it as to make them guilty of gross political impropriety and willful perjury, if, in their understanding, any proper division between local and federal authority, or anything in the Constitution they had made themselves, and sworn to support, forbade the Federal Government to control as to slavery in the federal territories.

Thus the twenty-one acted; and, as actions speak louder than words, so actions, under such responsibility, speak still louder.

Two of the twenty-three voted against Congressional prohibition of slavery in the federal territories, in the instances in which they acted upon the question. But for what reasons they so voted is not known. They may have done so because they thought a proper division of local from federal authority, or some provision or principle of the Constitution, stood in the way; or they may, without any such question, have voted against the prohibition, on what appeared to them to be sufficient grounds of expediency.

No one - who has sworn to support the Constitution - can conscientiously vote for what he understands to be an unconstitutional measure, however expedient he may think it; but one may and ought to vote against a measure which he deems constitutional, if, at the same time, he deems it inexpedient. It, therefore, would be unsafe to set down even the two who voted against the prohibition, as having done so because, in their understanding, any proper division of local from federal authority, or anything in the Constitution, forbade the Federal Government to control as to slavery in federal territory.

[ US Pledge of Allegiance ( HISTORY) :  SOURCE: https://goordnance.army.mil/hof/2000/2001/balch.html 
"... Captain and Brevet Lieutenant Colonel... George T. Balch ...Toward the end of his life, while auditor of the New York City Board of Education, he devoted much effort to  promoting patriotism in the children of the nation's public schools. A motto he drafted in this connection,  "We give our heads and hearts to God and our country; one country, one language, one flag!" was adopted by a number of schools in many states. It was Captain Balch who proposed that flagpoles be erected on or in front of all the public schools in the nation, and he became nationally known for his work on this project. ..." ]

The remaining sixteen of the "thirty-nine," so far as I have discovered, have left no record of their understanding upon the direct question of federal control of slavery in the federal territories. But there is much reason to believe that their understanding upon that question would not have appeared different from that of their twenty-three compeers, had it been manifested at all.

For the purpose of adhering rigidly to the text, I have purposely omitted whatever understanding may have been manifested by any person, however distinguished, other than the 'thirty-nine fathers" who framed the original Constitution; and, for the same reason, I have also omitted whatever understanding may have been manifested by any of the "thirty-nine" even, on any other phase of the general question of slavery. If we should look into their acts and declarations on those other phases, as the foreign slave trade, and the morality and policy of slavery generally, it would appear to us that on the direct question of federal control of slavery in federal territories, the sixteen, if they had acted at all, would probably have acted just as the twenty-three did.

Among that sixteen, were several of the most noted "anti-slavery men of those times" - as Dr. Franklin, Alexander Hamilton and Gouverneur Morris - while there was not one now known to have been otherwise, unless it may be John Rutledge, of South Carolina.

The sum of the whole - is, [that] of our thirty-nine fathers who framed the original Constitution, twenty-one - a clear majority of the whole - certainly understood that no proper division of local from federal authority, nor any part of the Constitution, forbade the Federal Government to control slavery in the federal territories;

while - all the rest probably had the same understanding.

Such, unquestionably, was the understanding of our fathers who framed the original Constitution; and the text affirms that they understood the question "better than we."

But, so far, I have been considering the understanding of the question manifested by the framers of the original Constitution (1787).

In and by the original instrument, a mode was provided for amending it; and, as I have already stated, the present frame of "the Government under which we live" consists of that original, and twelve amendatory articles framed and adopted since.

Those who now insist that federal control of slavery - in federal territories - violates the Constitution, point us to the provisions which they suppose it thus violates; and, as I understand, that all fix upon provisions in these amendatory articles, and not in the original instrument.

The Supreme Court, in the "Dred Scott case", plant themselves upon the fifth amendment, which provides that no person shall be deprived of "life, liberty or property without due process of law;" while Senator Douglas - and his peculiar adherents - plant themselves upon the tenth amendment, providing that "the powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution" "are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."

 [ https://www.history.com/topics/black-history/dred-scott-case ]

 [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1st_United_States_Congress ] 

Now, it so happens that these amendments were framed by the first Congress which sat under the Constitution - the identical Congress which passed the act already mentioned, enforcing the prohibition of slavery in the Northwestern Territory. Not only was it the same Congress, but they were the "identical", [AND] "same individual men" who, at the same session, and at the same time within the session, had under consideration, and in progress toward maturity, these Constitutional amendments, and this act prohibiting slavery in all the territory the nation then owned.

The "Constitutional amendments" [referenced by Douglas adherents]  were introduced before, and passed after the act enforcing the Ordinance of '87; so that, during the whole pendency of the act to enforce the Ordinance, the Constitutional amendments were also pending. [ https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/United_States_Statutes_at_Large/Volume_1/1st_Congress/1st_Session/Chapter_8 ]

The seventy-six members of that Congress, including sixteen of the framers of the original Constitution, as before stated, were pre- eminently our fathers who framed that part of "the Government under which we live", which - is now claimed [by Douglas] as forbidding the Federal Government to control slavery in the federal territories.

Is it not a little presumptuous - in any one at this day - to affirm that the two things which that Congress deliberately framed, and carried to maturity at the same time, are absolutely inconsistent with each other?

And, does not such affirmation become impudently absurd when coupled with the other affirmation from the same mouth, that those who did the two things, alleged to be inconsistent, understood whether they really were inconsistent better than we - better than he who affirms that they are inconsistent?

It is surely "safe" to assume that the thirty-nine framers of the original Constitution, and the seventy-six members of the Congress which framed the amendments thereto, taken together, do certainly include those who may be fairly called "our fathers who framed the Government under which we live."

And - so assuming, I defy any man to show that any one of them ever, in his whole life, declared that, in his understanding, any proper division of local from federal authority, or any part of the Constitution, forbade the Federal Government to control as to slavery in the federal territories.

I go a step further. I defy any one to show [that] any living man in the whole world ever did, prior to the beginning of the present century, (and I might almost say - prior to the beginning of the last half of the present century,) declare that, in his understanding, any proper division of local from federal authority, or any part of the Constitution, forbade the Federal Government to control as to slavery in the federal territories.

To those who now so declare, I give, not only "our "fathers" who "framed" the Government under which we live," but with them all other living men within the century in which it was framed, among whom to search, and they shall not be able to find the evidence of a single man agreeing with them.

Now, and here, let me guard a little against being misunderstood.

 I do not mean to say we are bound to follow "implicitly" in whatever our fathers did. To do so, would be to discard all the lights of current experience - to reject all progress - all improvement.

What I do say - is, [that] if we would supplant the opinions and policy of our fathers - in any case, we should do so upon evidence so conclusive, and argument so clear, that even their great authority, fairly considered and weighed, cannot stand; and most surely not in a case whereof we ourselves declare they understood the question better than we.

If any man - at this day - sincerely believes [that] a proper division of local from federal authority, or any part of the Constitution, forbids the Federal Government to control as to slavery in the federal territories, he is right to say so, and to enforce his position by all truthful evidence and fair argument which he can.

But, he has no right to mislead others, who have less access to history, and less leisure to study it, into the false belief that "our fathers who framed the Government under which we live" were of the same opinion; Thus,  substituting "falsehood" and "deception" for truthful evidence and fair argument. [ Donald Trump does this. The "big lie".]

If any man at this day sincerely believes "our fathers who framed the Government under which we live," used and applied principles, in other cases, which ought to have led them to understand that a proper division of local from federal authority or some part of the Constitution, forbids the Federal Government to control as to slavery in the federal territories, he is right to say so.

But he should, at the same time, brave the responsibility of declaring that, in his opinion, he understands their principles better than they did themselves; and especially should he not shirk that responsibility by asserting that they "understood the question just as well, and even better, than we do now."

But enough! Let all who believe that "our fathers, who framed the Government under which we live, understood this question just as well, and even better, than we do now," speak as they spoke, and act as they acted upon it.

This is all Republicans ask - all Republicans desire - in relation to slavery.
As those "fathers" ( our founding fathers) marked it, so let it be again marked, as an evil not to be extended, but to be tolerated and protected only because of - and so far as - its actual presence among us makes that toleration and protection a necessity.

Let all the guarantees those fathers gave it, be, not grudgingly, but fully and fairly, maintained. 

 For this Republicans contend, and with this, so far as I know or believe, they will be content.

And now, if they would listen - as I suppose they will not - I would address a few words to the "Southern people".

I would say to them: - You consider yourselves a reasonable and a just people; and I consider that in the general qualities of reason and justice you are not inferior to any other people.
 Still, when you speak of us "Republicans", you do so only to denounce us as "reptiles", or, at the best, as no better than "outlaws".

You will grant a hearing to "pirates" or "murderers"  , but nothing like it to "Black Republicans".

[ http://xroads.virginia.edu/~CAP/SCARTOONS/car1860.html ] 

In all your contentions with one another, each of you deems an unconditional condemnation of "Black Republicanism" as the first thing to be attended to. Indeed, such condemnation (of us) seems to be an indispensable prerequisite - license, so to speak - among you - to be admitted or permitted to speak at all. Now, can you, or not, be prevailed upon to pause and to consider whether this is quite just to us? - or even to yourselves?

 Bring forward your charges and specifications, and then be patient long enough to hear us deny or justify.

You say we are "sectional". We deny it. That makes an issue; and the burden of proof is upon you.

 You produce your proof; and what is it? Why, that our party has no existence in your section - gets no votes in your section. The fact is substantially true; but does it prove the issue? If it does, then in case we should, without change of principle, begin to get votes in your section, we should thereby cease to be sectional. You cannot escape this conclusion; and yet, are you willing to abide by it?

 If you are, you will probably soon find that we have ceased to be sectional, for we shall get votes in your section this very year.

You will then begin to discover, as the truth plainly is, that your "proof" does not touch the issue.

The fact that we get no votes in your section, is a "fact" of your making, and not of ours.

And - if there be fault in that fact, that fault is primarily yours; and remains - until you show that we "repel you" by some wrong principle or practice.

If we do "repel you" by any wrong principle or practice, the fault is ours; but, this brings you to where you ought to have started - to a discussion of the right or wrong of our principle.
If our principle, put in practice, would wrong your section for the benefit of ours, or for any other object, then our principle, and we with it, are "sectional", and are justly opposed and denounced as such.


Meet us, then, on the question of whether our "principle", put in practice, would wrong your section; and, so meet it as if it were possible that something may be said on our side. Do you accept the challenge? No!

Then you really believe that the principle which "our fathers who framed the Government under which we live" thought so clearly right as to adopt it, and indorse it again and again, upon their official oaths, is in fact so clearly wrong as to demand your condemnation without a moment's consideration.

Some of you delight to flaunt in our faces the warning against sectional parties given by Washington in his Farewell Address.
 

[ Washington "Farewell Address" : https://www.ourdocuments.gov/doc.php?flash=false&doc=15&page=transcript ]

[ Washington LaFayette "1797" "slavery" :  https://washingtonpapers.org/resources/topics/slavery/
   - https://www.mountvernon.org/library/digitalhistory/digital-encyclopedia/article/marquis-de-lafayette-s-plan-for-slavery/ ]

Less than eight years before Washington gave that warning, he had, as President of the United States, approved and signed an act of Congress, enforcing the prohibition of slavery in the Northwestern Territory; Which, this "act" embodied the policy of the Government upon that subject up to and at the very moment he penned that warning;
and about one year after he penned it (1796 + 1), he wrote LaFayette that he considered that prohibition a wise measure, expressing in the same connection his hope that we should at some time have a confederacy of "free States".

[ https://www.britannica.com/topic/sectionalism ]

Bearing this in mind, and seeing that sectionalism has since arisen upon this same subject, is that warning a weapon in your hands against us? - or, in our hands against you?

Could Washington himself speak, would he cast the blame of that "sectionalism" upon us, who sustain his policy, or upon you who repudiate it?

 We respect that warning of Washington, and we commend it to you, together with his example pointing to the right application of it.

"name calling"

 But you say you are "conservative" - "eminently conservative" - while we are "revolutionary", "destructive", or something of the sort.

What is conservatism? Is it not adherence to the old and tried, against the new and untried?

 We stick to, contend for, the identical "old policy" on the point in controversy which was adopted by "our fathers who framed the Government under which we live;" while you - with one accord reject, and scout [scoff], and spit upon that "old policy", and insist upon substituting something new.

True, you disagree among yourselves as to what that substitute shall be. You are divided on new propositions and plans, but you are unanimous in rejecting and denouncing the old policy of the fathers.

Some of you are for reviving the "foreign slave trade:;
some for a "Congressional Slave-Code for the Territories";
some for Congress forbidding the Territories to prohibit Slavery within their limits;
some for maintaining Slavery in the Territories through the judiciary;
some for the "gur-reat pur-rin-ciple" that "if one man would enslave another, no third man should object,"
 -  fantastically called "Popular Sovereignty;"
but,  never - a man among you - is in favor of federal prohibition of slavery in federal territories, according to the practice of "our fathers who framed the Government under which we live."
Not one - of all your various plans - can show a precedent or an advocate in the century within which our Government originated.

Consider, then, whether your claim of "conservatism" for yourselves, and your charge or destructiveness against us, are based on the most clear and stable foundations.

Again, you say we have made "the slavery question" more prominent than it formerly was. We deny it.
 We admit that it is more prominent, but we deny that we made it so.

It was not we, but you, who discarded the "old policy" of the fathers.

We resisted, and still resist, your "innovation"; and thence comes the greater prominence of the question.

Would you have that question reduced to its former proportions? Go back to that "old policy". What has been will be again, under the same conditions. If you would have the peace of the old times, re-adopt the precepts and policy of the old times.

You charge [that] we stir up "insurrections" among your slaves. We deny it; and what is your proof? Harper's Ferry! John Brown!!

John Brown was no Republican; and, you have failed to implicate a single Republican in his Harper's Ferry enterprise.

If any member of our party is guilty in that matter, you know it  - or, you do not know it.

If you do know it - you are inexcusable for not designating the man and proving the fact.
If you do not know it, you are inexcusable for asserting it, and especially for persisting in the assertion after you have tried and failed to make the proof.
You need to be told: [that] persisting in a charge - which one does not know to be true - is simply malicious slander.

Some of you admit that no Republican designedly aided or encouraged the Harper's Ferry affair. But still, insist that our doctrines and declarations necessarily lead to such results. We do not believe it.
 We know we hold to no doctrine, and make no declaration, which were not held to and made by "our fathers who framed the Government under which we live." You never dealt fairly (by us) in relation to this affair.

When it occurred, some important State elections were near at hand, and you were in evident glee with the belief that, by charging the blame upon us, you could get an advantage of us in those elections.
 The elections came, and your expectations were not quite fulfilled.

Every Republican man knew that, as to himself at least, your charge was a "slander", and he was not much inclined by it to cast his vote in your favor.

Republican doctrines and declarations are accompanied with a continual protest against any interference whatever with your slaves, or with you about your slaves.

Surely, this does not encourage them to revolt. True, we do, in common with "our fathers, who framed the Government under which we live," declare our belief that slavery is wrong;

But - the slaves - do not hear us declare even this.
For anything we say or do, the slaves would scarcely know there is a "Republican party".
I believe they would not, in fact, generally know it but for your misrepresentations of us, in their hearing.

In your political contests - among yourselves, each "faction" charges the other (faction) with sympathy with "Black Republicanism"; and then, to give point to the charge, defines "Black Republicanism" to simply be: insurrection, "blood and thunder" among the slaves.

Slave insurrections are no more common now than they were before the Republican party was organized.
 

 [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nat_Turner%27s_slave_rebellion ]

What induced the "Southampton insurrection", twenty-eight years ago, in which, at least three times as many lives were lost as at Harper's Ferry? You can scarcely stretch your very elastic fancy to the conclusion that Southampton was "got up by Black Republicanism."
In the present state of things in the United States, I do not think a general, or even a very extensive slave insurrection is possible.
The indispensable concert of action cannot be attained. The slaves have no means of rapid communication; nor can incendiary freemen, black or white, supply it. The explosive materials are everywhere in parcels; but there neither are, nor can be supplied, the indispensable connecting trains.

Much is said by Southern people about the affection of slaves for their masters and mistresses; and a part of it, at least, is true.

A plot for an uprising could scarcely be devised and communicated to twenty individuals before some one of them, to save the life of a favorite master or mistress, would divulge it. This is the rule; and the slave revolution in Haiti was not an exception to it, but a case occurring under peculiar circumstances.

The gunpowder plot of British history, though not connected with slaves, was more in point. In that case, only about twenty were admitted to the secret; and yet one of them, in his anxiety to save a friend, betrayed the plot to that friend, and, by consequence, averted the calamity.

Occasional poisonings from the kitchen, and open or stealthy assassinations in the field, and local revolts extending to a score or so, will continue to occur as the natural results of slavery; but no general insurrection of slaves, as I think, can happen in this country - for a long time. Whoever "much fears", or "much hopes" for such an event, will be alike disappointed.

In the language of Mr. Jefferson, uttered many years ago, [ https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/98-01-02-1756 ]
"It is still in our power to direct the process of emancipation, and deportation, peaceably, and in such slow degrees, as that the evil will wear off insensibly; and their places be, pari passu, filled up by free white laborers.
If, on the contrary, it is left to force itself on, human nature must shudder at the prospect held up."

Mr. Jefferson did not mean to say, nor do I, that the power of emancipation is in the Federal Government.

He spoke of Virginia; and, as to the power of emancipation, I speak of the slaveholding States only. The Federal Government, however, as we insist, has the power of restraining the extension of the institution - the power to insure that a slave insurrection shall never occur on any American soil which is now free from slavery.

John Brown's effort was peculiar. It was not a "slave insurrection".
It was an attempt - by white men - to get up a revolt among slaves, in which the slaves refused to participate.

In fact, it was so absurd that the slaves, with all their ignorance, saw plainly enough it could not succeed. That affair, in its philosophy, corresponds with the many attempts, related in history, at the assassination of kings and emperors.

An enthusiast broods over the oppression of a people - till he fancies himself commissioned by Heaven to liberate them. He ventures the attempt, which ends in little else than his own execution. Orsini's attempt on Louis Napoleon, and John Brown's attempt at Harper's Ferry were, in their philosophy, precisely the same. The eagerness to cast blame on old England in the one case, and on New England in the other, does not disprove the sameness of the two things.

And how much would it avail you, if you could, by the use of John Brown, Helper's Book, and the like, break up the Republican organization?

Human action can be modified - to some extent, but "human nature" cannot be changed.
There is a judgment and a feeling against slavery in this nation, which cast at least a million and a half of votes. You cannot destroy that judgment and feeling - that sentiment - by breaking up the political organization which rallies around it. You can scarcely scatter and disperse an army which has been formed into order in the face of your heaviest fire; but if you could, how much would you gain by forcing the sentiment which created it out of the peaceful channel of the ballot-box, into some other channel? What would that other channel probably be? Would the number of John Browns be lessened or enlarged by the operation?

But you will "break up" the Union rather than submit to a denial of your Constitutional rights.

That has a somewhat reckless sound; but it would be palliated, if not fully justified, were we proposing, by the mere force of numbers, to deprive you of some right, plainly written down in the Constitution. But, we are proposing no such thing.

When you make these declarations, you have a specific and well-understood allusion to an assumed Constitutional right of yours, to take slaves into the federal territories, and to hold them there as property. But no such right is specifically written in the Constitution. That instrument is literally silent about any such right. We, on the contrary, deny that such a right has any existence in the Constitution, even by implication.

Your purpose, then, plainly stated, is:  that you will destroy the Government, unless you be allowed to construe and enforce the Constitution as you please, on all points in dispute between you and us. You will rule or ruin in all events.

This, plainly stated, is your language.

Perhaps you will say the Supreme Court has decided the disputed Constitutional question in your favor. Not quite so. But waiving the lawyer's distinction between dictum and decision, the Court have decided the question for you in a sort of way. The Court have substantially said, it is your Constitutional right to take slaves into the federal territories, and to hold them there as property. When I say the decision was made in a sort of way, I mean it was made in a divided Court, by a bare majority of the Judges, and they not quite agreeing with one another in the reasons for making it; that it is so made as that its avowed supporters disagree with one another about its meaning, and that it was mainly based upon a mistaken statement of fact - the statement in the opinion that "the right of property in a slave is distinctly and expressly affirmed in the Constitution."

An inspection of the Constitution will show that the right of property in a slave is not "distinctly and expressly affirmed" in it. Bear in mind, the Judges do not pledge their judicial opinion that such right is impliedly affirmed in the Constitution; but they pledge their veracity that it is "distinctly and expressly" affirmed there - "distinctly," that is, not mingled with anything else - "expressly," that is, in words meaning just that, without the aid of any inference, and susceptible of no other meaning.

If they had only pledged their judicial opinion that such right is affirmed in the instrument by implication, it would be open to others to show that neither the word "slave" nor "slavery" is to be found in the Constitution, nor the word "property" even, in any connection with language alluding to the things slave, or slavery; and that wherever in that instrument the slave is alluded to, he is called a "person;" - and wherever his master's legal right in relation to him is alluded to, it is spoken of as "service or labor which may be due," - as a debt payable in service or labor. Also, it would be open to show, by contemporaneous history, that this mode of alluding to slaves and slavery, instead of speaking of them, was employed on purpose to exclude from the Constitution the idea that there could be property in man.

To show all this, is easy and certain.

When this obvious mistake of the Judges shall be brought to their notice, is it not reasonable to expect that they will withdraw the mistaken statement, and reconsider the conclusion based upon it?

And then it is to be remembered that "our fathers, who framed the Government under which we live" - the men who made the Constitution - decided this same Constitutional question in our favor, long ago - decided it without division among themselves, when making the decision; without division among themselves about the meaning of it after it was made, and, so far as any evidence is left, without basing it upon any mistaken statement of facts.

Under all these circumstances, do you really feel yourselves justified to break up this Government unless such a court decision as yours is, shall be at once submitted to as a conclusive and final rule of political action? But you will not abide the election of a Republican president! In that supposed event, you say, you will destroy the Union; and then, you say, the great crime of having destroyed it will be upon us! That is cool. A highwayman holds a pistol to my ear, and mutters through his teeth, "Stand and deliver, or I shall kill you, and then you will be a murderer!"

To be sure, what the robber demanded of me - my money - was my own; and I had a clear right to keep it; but it was no more my own than my vote is my own; and the threat of death to me, to extort my money, and the threat of destruction to the Union, to extort my vote, can scarcely be distinguished in principle.

A few words now to Republicans. It is exceedingly desirable that all parts of this great Confederacy shall be at peace, and in harmony, one with another. Let us Republicans do our part to have it so. Even though much provoked, let us do nothing through passion and ill temper. Even though the southern people will not so much as listen to us, let us calmly consider their demands, and yield to them if, in our deliberate view of our duty, we possibly can. Judging by all they say and do, and by the subject and nature of their controversy with us, let us determine, if we can, what will satisfy them.

Will they be satisfied if the Territories be unconditionally surrendered to them? We know they will not. In all their present complaints against us, the Territories are scarcely mentioned. Invasions and insurrections are the rage now. Will it satisfy them, if, in the future, we have nothing to do with invasions and insurrections? We know it will not. We so know, because we know we never had anything to do with invasions and insurrections; and yet this total abstaining does not exempt us from the charge and the denunciation.

The question recurs, what will satisfy them? Simply this: We must not only let them alone, but we must somehow, convince them that we do let them alone. This, we know by experience, is no easy task. We have been so trying to convince them from the very beginning of our organization, but with no success. In all our platforms and speeches we have constantly protested our purpose to let them alone; but this has had no tendency to convince them. Alike unavailing to convince them, is the fact that they have never detected a man of us in any attempt to disturb them.

These natural, and apparently adequate means all failing, what will convince them? This, and this only: cease to call slavery wrong, and join them in calling it right. And this must be done thoroughly - done in acts as well as in words. Silence will not be tolerated - we must place ourselves avowedly with them. Senator Douglas' new sedition law must be enacted and enforced, suppressing all declarations that slavery is wrong, whether made in politics, in presses, in pulpits, or in private. We must arrest and return their fugitive slaves with greedy pleasure. We must pull down our Free State constitutions. The whole atmosphere must be disinfected from all taint of opposition to slavery, before they will cease to believe that all their troubles proceed from us.

I am quite aware they do not state their case precisely in this way. Most of them would probably say to us, "Let us alone, do nothing to us, and say what you please about slavery." But we do let them alone - have never disturbed them - so that, after all, it is what we say, which dissatisfies them. They will continue to accuse us of doing, until we cease saying.

I am also aware they have not, as yet, in terms, demanded the overthrow of our Free-State Constitutions. Yet those Constitutions declare the wrong of slavery, with more solemn emphasis, than do all other sayings against it; and when all these other sayings shall have been silenced, the overthrow of these Constitutions will be demanded, and nothing be left to resist the demand. It is nothing to the contrary, that they do not demand the whole of this just now. Demanding what they do, and for the reason they do, they can voluntarily stop nowhere short of this consummation. Holding, as they do, that slavery is morally right, and socially elevating, they cannot cease to demand a full national recognition of it, as a legal right, and a social blessing.

Nor can we justifiably withhold this, on any ground save our conviction that slavery is wrong. If slavery is right, all words, acts, laws, and constitutions against it, are themselves wrong, and should be silenced, and swept away. If it is right, we cannot justly object to its nationality - its universality; if it is wrong, they cannot justly insist upon its extension - its enlargement. All they ask, we could readily grant, if we thought slavery right; all we ask, they could as readily grant, if they thought it wrong. Their thinking it right, and our thinking it wrong, is the precise fact upon which depends the whole controversy. Thinking it right, as they do, they are not to blame for desiring its full recognition, as being right; but, thinking it wrong, as we do, can we yield to them? Can we cast our votes with their view, and against our own? In view of our moral, social, and political responsibilities, can we do this?

Wrong as we think slavery is, we can yet afford to let it alone where it is, because that much is due to the necessity arising from its actual presence in the nation; but can we, while our votes will prevent it, allow it to spread into the National Territories, and to overrun us here in these Free States? If our sense of duty forbids this, then let us stand by our duty, fearlessly and effectively. Let us be diverted by none of those sophistical contrivances wherewith we are so industriously plied and belabored - contrivances such as groping for some middle ground between the right and the wrong, vain as the search for a man who should be neither a living man nor a dead man - such as a policy of "don't care" on a question about which all true men do care - such as Union appeals beseeching true Union men to yield to Disunionists, reversing the divine rule, and calling, not the sinners, but the righteous to repentance - such as invocations to Washington, imploring men to unsay what Washington said, and undo what Washington did.

Neither let us be slandered from our duty by false accusations against us, nor frightened from it by menaces of destruction to the Government nor of dungeons to ourselves. LET US HAVE FAITH THAT RIGHT MAKES MIGHT, AND IN THAT FAITH, LET US, TO THE END, DARE TO DO OUR DUTY AS WE UNDERSTAND IT.

..."

"...  Despite some intra-party opposition from Salmon Chase and the Radical Republicans, "...  ( The Radical Republicans were a faction of American politicians within the Republican Party of the United States from around 1854 (before the American Civil War) until the end of Reconstruction in 1877. ) They called themselves "Radicals" because of their goal of immediate, complete, permanent eradication of slavery, without compromise. They were opposed during the War by the moderate Republicans (led by U.S. President Abraham Lincoln),  ..."

Lincoln won his party's nomination at the 1864 National Union National Convention. Rather than re-nominate Vice President Hannibal Hamlin, the convention selected "Andrew Johnson" of Tennessee, a War Democrat, as Lincoln's running mate. John C. Frémont ran as the nominee of the Radical Democracy Party, which criticized Lincoln for being too moderate on the issue of racial equality, but Frémont withdrew from the race in September. The Democrats were divided between the Copperheads, who favored immediate peace with the Confederacy, and War Democrats, who supported the war. The 1864 Democratic National Convention nominated McClellan, a War Democrat, but adopted a platform advocating peace with the Confederacy, which McClellan rejected.

Despite his early fears of defeat, Lincoln won strong majorities in the popular and electoral vote, partly as a result of the recent Union victory at the Battle of Atlanta.^[3] As the Civil War was still raging, no electoral votes were counted from any of the eleven southern states that had joined the Confederate States of America.^[1] Lincoln's re-election ensured that he would preside over the successful conclusion of the Civil War.

Lincoln's victory made him the first president to win re-election since Andrew Jackson in 1832, as well as the first Northern president to ever win re-election. Lincoln was assassinated less than two months into his second term, and he was succeeded by his vice president, Andrew Johnson, who favored quick restoration of the seceded states to the Union without protection for the former slaves. This led to conflict with the Republican-dominated Congress, culminating in his impeachment by the House of Representatives in 1868. He was acquitted in the Senate by one vote.  ..."

SOURCE: https://www.cleveland.com/news/2020/02/scholar-to-explain-why-abraham-lincoln-chose-andrew-johnson-as-replacement-running-mate.html

 "CLEVELAND, Ohio – Hannibal Hamlin was vice president during Abraham Lincoln’s first term as president, but when Lincoln ran for re-election in 1864, he tapped Andrew Johnson, a Southerner, to be his running mate. "

 Andrew Johnson > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrew_Johnson "...  Andrew Johnson (December 29, 1808 – July 31, 1875) was the 17th president of the United States, serving from 1865 to 1869. He assumed the presidency as he was vice president at the time of the assassination of Abraham Lincoln. Johnson was a Democrat who ran with Lincoln on the National Union ticket, coming to office as the Civil War concluded. He favored quick restoration of the seceded states to the Union without protection for the former slaves. This led to conflict with the Republican-dominated Congress, culminating in his impeachment by the House of Representatives in 1868. He was acquitted in the Senate by one vote.

... Johnson was born into poverty in Raleigh, North Carolina, and he never attended school. He was apprenticed as a tailor and worked in several frontier towns before settling in Greeneville, Tennessee. He served as alderman and mayor there before being elected to the Tennessee House of Representatives in 1835. After briefly serving in the Tennessee Senate, Johnson was elected to the House of Representatives in 1843, where he served five two-year terms. He became governor of Tennessee for four years, and was elected by the legislature to the Senate in 1857. In his congressional service, he sought passage of the Homestead Bill which was enacted soon after he left his Senate seat in 1862. Southern slave states seceded to form the Confederate States of America, including Tennessee, but Johnson remained firmly with the Union. He was the only sitting senator from a Confederate state who did not resign his seat upon learning of his state's secession. In 1862, Lincoln appointed him as Military Governor of Tennessee after most of it had been retaken. In 1864, Johnson was a logical choice as running mate for Lincoln, who wished to send a message of national unity in his re-election campaign; and became vice president after a victorious election in 1864. [ AS CITED ABOVE, JOHNSON WAS PICKED - AS THE "RUNNING MATE" - FOR LINCLON - IN THE ELECTION OF 1864.

Johnson implemented his own form of Presidential Reconstruction, a series of proclamations directing the seceded states to hold conventions and elections to reform their civil governments. Southern states returned many of their old leaders and passed Black Codes to deprive the freedmen of many civil liberties, but Congressional Republicans refused to seat legislators from those states and advanced legislation to overrule the Southern actions. Johnson vetoed their bills, and Congressional Republicans overrode him, setting a pattern for the remainder of his presidency.^[1] Johnson opposed the Fourteenth Amendment which gave citizenship to former slaves. In 1866. He went on an unprecedented national tour promoting his executive policies, seeking to break Republican opposition.^[2] As the conflict grew between the branches of government, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act - restricting Johnson's ability to fire Cabinet officials. He persisted in trying to dismiss Secretary of War Edwin Stanton, but ended up being impeached by the House of Representatives and narrowly avoided conviction in the Senate. He did not win the 1868 Democratic presidential nomination and left office the following year. ...
 
Andrew Johnson's slaves : ( https://www.nps.gov/anjo/learn/historyculture/slaves.htm )  ..." 

Hannibal Hamlin  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hannibal_Hamlin  ABRAHAM LINCOLN'S FIRST VICE PRESIDENT "...  Hannibal Hamlin (August 27, 1809 – July 4, 1891) was an American attorney and politician from Maine. In a public service career that spanned over 50 years, he served as the 15th vice president of the United States. The first Republican to hold the office, Hamlin served from 1861 to 1865. He is considered among the most influential politicians from Maine.

A native of "Paris, Maine" (part of Massachusetts until 1820), Hamlin managed his father's farm before becoming a newspaper editor. He studied law, was admitted to the bar in 1833, and began to practice in Hampden, Maine. Originally a Democrat, Hamlin began his political career with election to the Maine House of Representatives in 1835 and an appointment to the military staff of the Governor of Maine. As an officer in the militia, he took part in the 1839 negotiations that helped end the Aroostook War. Hamlin was elected twice to the United States House of Representatives where he served from 1843 to 1847. In 1848 the state house elected him to the United States Senate, where he served until January 1857. He served temporarily as governor of Maine for six weeks in the beginning of 1857, after which he returned to the Senate. Hamlin was an active opponent of slavery; he supported the Wilmot Proviso and opposed the Compromise of 1850. In 1854, he strongly opposed passage of the Kansas–Nebraska Act. Hamlin's increasingly anti-slavery views caused him to leave the Democratic Party for the newly formed Republican Party in 1856.

In the 1860 election, Hamlin was the Republican nominee for Vice President. Selected to run with Abraham Lincoln, who was from Illinois, Hamlin was chosen in part to bring geographic balance to the ticket and in part because as a former Democrat, he could work to convince other anti-slavery Democrats that their future lay with the Republican Party. The Lincoln and Hamlin ticket was successful, and Hamlin served as Vice President from 1861 to 1865, which included all but the last month of the American Civil War. The first Republican vice president, Hamlin held the office in an era when the office was considered more a part of the legislative branch than the executive; he was not personally close to Lincoln and did not play a major role in his administration. Even so, Hamlin supported the administration's legislative program in his role as presiding officer of the Senate, and he looked for other ways to demonstrate his support for the Union, including a term of service in a Maine militia unit during the war.

For the 1864 election, Hamlin was replaced as vice presidential nominee by Andrew Johnson, a Southern Democrat chosen for his appeal to Southern Unionists. After leaving the vice presidency, Hamlin served as Collector of the Port of Boston, a lucrative post to which he was appointed by Johnson after the latter succeeded to the presidency following Lincoln's assassination. However, Hamlin later resigned as Collector because of his disagreement with Johnson over Reconstruction of the former Confederate States of America.

In 1869, Hamlin was elected again to the U.S. Senate, and he served two terms. After leaving the Senate in 1881, he served briefly as United States Ambassador to Spain before returning to Maine in late 1882. In retirement, Hamlin was a resident of Bangor, Maine, where he died in 1891. He was buried at Mount Hope Cemetery in Bangor. ..."

 [ They - (the) REPUBLICANS -  persisted - in the federal government -  until [[ the Compromise of 1877 : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compromise_of_1877  ]] when the Republicans agreed to cease protecting the rights of African Americans in the South [ The Republicans Removed Federal Troops ] --  in order for Democrats to concede the presidential election of 1876 - to the Republican candidate [Hayes].

Southern white Democrats, calling themselves "Redeemers", [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redeemers ]took control of the South after the [Federal Troops were removed] - rersulting in the "end of Reconstruction"... From 1890 to 1910, the "Redeemers" ["Southern white Democrats" ] established so-called "Jim Crow laws", disenfranchising most blacks and some poor whites throughout the region. Blacks would face racial segregation nationwide, especially in the South.[99] They also occasionally experienced vigilante violence, including lynching.[100]

source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States#History

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SOURCE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redeemers "... In United States history, the Redeemers were a political coalition in the Southern United States during the Reconstruction Era that followed the Civil War. [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reconstruction_era ] Redeemers were the Southern wing of the Democratic Party. They sought to regain their political power and enforce white supremacy. Their policy of Redemption was intended to oust the "Radical Republicans", a coalition of BLACK freedmen - and others (they demonized as: "carpetbaggers", and "scalawags"). THE "REDEEMERS" -were led by [THOSE WHO HAD LOST THE US CIVIL WAR [the rich former planters, businessmen, and professionals,] and THE "REDEEMERS" dominated Southern politics in most Southern areas - from the 1870s to 1910.

During "Reconstruction" [IMMEDIATELY FOLLOWING THE CIVIL WAR], the South was under occupation by federal forces, and Southern state governments were dominated by Republicans - elected largely by freedmen and allies. ABRAHAM Lincoln - founded this "Republican Party" - AND, Abraham Lincoln - had won the Civil War.  Republicans (nationally) pressed for the granting of political rights to the newly-freed slaves as the key to their becoming full citizens and the votes they would cast for the party. The Thirteenth Amendment (banning slavery), Fourteenth Amendment (guaranteeing the civil rights of former slaves and ensuring equal protection of the laws), and Fifteenth Amendment (prohibiting the denial of the right to vote on grounds of race, color, or previous condition of servitude), enshrined such political rights in the Constitution.

Numerous educated blacks moved to the South to work for Reconstruction. Some were elected to office in the Southern states, or were appointed to certain positions. The "Reconstruction governments" [ of the victorious North] were unpopular with many white Southerners, who were not willing to accept "defeat" and continued to try to prevent black political activity by any means. While the elite planter class often supported insurgencies, violence against freedmen and other Republicans was usually carried out by other whites; the secret Ku Klux Klan chapters developed in the first years after the war as one form of insurgency.

In the 1870s, paramilitary organizations, such as the White League in Louisiana and Red Shirts in Mississippi and North Carolina, undermined the Republicans, disrupting meetings and political gatherings. These paramilitary bands also used violence and threats of violence to undermine the Republican vote. By the presidential election of 1876, only three Southern states – Louisiana, South Carolina, and Florida – were "unredeemed", or not yet taken over by white Democrats. 

The disputed Presidential election - between Rutherford B. Hayes (the Republican governor of Ohio) and Samuel J. Tilden (the Democratic governor of New York) was allegedly resolved by the "Compromise of 1877", also known as the "Corrupt Bargain" or the Bargain of 1877.[1] In this compromise, it was claimed, Hayes [ the Republican ] became president - in exchange for numerous favors to the South, one of which was the removal of Federal troops from the remaining "unredeemed" Southern states; this was however a policy Hayes had endorsed during his campaign. With the removal of these [FEDERAL] forces, Reconstruction came to an end.  ..." 
   [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compromise_of_1877 ]

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 source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States#History

 Further immigration, expansion, and industrialization
 - Economic history of the United States and Technological and industrial history of the United States
File:Emigrants (i.e. immigrants) landing at Ellis Island -.webm
Film by Edison Studios showing immigrants disembarking at Ellis Island in New York Harbor, which served as a major entry point for European immigration into the U.S.[101]

 In the Northern United Staes, "urbanization" and an unprecedented influx of immigrants from Southern and Eastern Europe supplied a surplus of labor for the country's industrialization and transformed its culture.[102] 

 National infrastructure, including telegraph and transcontinental railroads, spurred economic growth and greater settlement and development of the American Old West. 

The later invention of electric light and the telephone would also affect communication and urban life.[103]

The United States fought "Indian Wars" west of the Mississippi River from 1810 to at least 1890.[104] 
 - Most of these conflicts ended with the cession of Native American territory and their confinement to Indian reservations. 

 Additionally, the Trail of Tears in the 1830s exemplified the Indian removal policy that forcibly resettled Indians. This further expanded acreage under mechanical cultivation, increasing surpluses for international markets.[105] 

Mainland expansion also included the purchase of Alaska from Russia in 1867.[106] 

 source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States#History

In 1893, pro-American elements in Hawaii overthrew the Hawaiian monarchy and formed the Republic of Hawaii, which the U.S. annexed in 1898. 
 [ https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/americans-overthrow-hawaiian-monarchy ]

 - Puerto Rico, Guam, and the Philippines were ceded by Spain in the same year, following the Spanish–American War.[107] 
 - American Samoa was acquired by the United States (in 1900) after the end of the Second Samoan Civil War.[108] 
 - The U.S. Virgin Islands were purchased from Denmark in 1917.[109]

(Rapid economic development during the late 19th and early 20th centuries fostered the rise of many prominent industrialists.)
 "Tycoons" like Cornelius Vanderbilt, John D. Rockefeller, and Andrew Carnegie led the nation's progress in the railroad, petroleum, and steel industries. Banking became a major part of the economy, with J. P. Morgan playing a notable role. The American economy boomed, becoming the world's largest.[110] 

These dramatic changes were accompanied by social unrest and the rise of populist, socialist, and anarchist movements.[111] This period eventually ended with the advent of the "Progressive Era", which saw significant reforms including women's suffrage, alcohol prohibition, regulation of consumer goods, and greater antitrust measures to ensure competition and attention to worker conditions.[112][113][114]

  source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States#History

 ( World War I, Great Depression, and World War II )
 [ World War I : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_I ]
The Empire State Building was the tallest building in the world when completed in 1931, during the Great Depression.

The United States remained neutral from the outbreak of World War I in 1914 until 1917 - when it joined the war as an "associated power" - alongside the Allies of World War I, helping to turn the tide against the Central Powers. 

 - In 1919, President Woodrow Wilson took a leading diplomatic role at the "Paris Peace Conference" and advocated strongly for the U.S. to join the League of Nations. However, the Senate refused to approve this and did not ratify the Treaty of Versailles that established the League of Nations.[115]
 - In 1920, the women's rights movement won passage of a constitutional amendment granting women's suffrage.[116] 
- The 1920s and 1930s saw the rise of radio for "mass communication" and the invention of "early television".[117] The prosperity of the "Roaring Twenties" ended with the "Wall Street Crash of 1929" and the onset of the Great Depression. 
After his election as president in 1932, Franklin D. Roosevelt responded with the New Deal.[118] 
The "Great Migration" of millions of African Americans - out of the American South - began before World War I and extended through the 1960s.[119] 

 The Dust Bowl of the mid-1930s impoverished many farming communities and spurred a new wave of western migration.[120]

 source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States#History

February 23, 1945 [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raising_the_Flag_on_Iwo_Jima ]
 - U.S. Marines raising the American flag on Mount Suribachi during the Battle of Iwo Jima in one of the most iconic images of the war.

[ World War II : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II ] source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States#History
At first effectively neutral during World War II, the United States began supplying "materiel" to the "Allies" in March 1941 through the Lend-Lease program. 
 [ Lend-Lease : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lend-Lease ]

 On December 7, 1941, the Empire of Japan launched a surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, prompting the United States to join the Allies against the Axis powers, and in the following year, to intern about 120,000[121] U.S. residents (including American citizens) of Japanese descent.[122] -- Although Japan attacked the United States first, the U.S. nonetheless pursued a "Europe first" defense policy.[123]  [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Europe_first ]

 The United States - thus, left its vast Asian colony, the Philippines, isolated and fighting a losing struggle against Japanese invasion and occupation. 

During the war, the United States was one of the "Four Powers"[124] who met to plan the postwar world, along with Britain, the Soviet Union, and China.[125][126] 
Although the nation lost around 400,000 military personnel,[127] it emerged "relatively" undamaged [BOMBING OF AMERICAN CITIES WAS MINIMIZED ] from the war with even greater economic and military influence.[128]

The United States played a leading role in the Bretton Woods and Yalta conferences, which signed agreements on new international financial institutions and Europe's postwar reorganization. [ Bretton Woods conference: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bretton_Woods_Conference  ::   Yalta conference : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yalta_Conference ]

As an "Allied victory" was won in Europe, a 1945 international conference held in San Francisco produced the "United Nations Charter", which became active after the war.[129]
 
 source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States#History

October 1944, The United States and Japan then fought each other in the largest naval battle in history, the Battle of Leyte Gulf.[130][131]  [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Leyte_Gulf]

1945 - The United States developed the first nuclear weapons - and used them on Japan in the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945; the Japanese surrendered on September 2, ending World War II.[132][133]

  source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States#History

 ( Cold War and civil rights era)
Main articles: History of the United States (1945–1964), History of the United States (1964–1980), and History of the United States (1980–1991) Further information: Cold War, Civil Rights Movement, War on Poverty, Space Race, and Reaganomics

- Martin Luther King Jr. gives his famous "I Have a Dream" speech at the Lincoln Memorial during the March on Washington, 1963

image: U.S. president Ronald Reagan (left) and Soviet general secretary Mikhail Gorbachev - at the Geneva Summit in 1985

After World War II, the United States and the Soviet Union competed for power, influence, and prestige during what became known as the "Cold War", driven by an ideological divide between capitalism and communism.[134] 

They ( the United States and the Soviet Union  ) dominated the military affairs of Europe, with the U.S. and its NATO allies on one side and the Soviet Union and its Warsaw Pact allies on the other. 

 The U.S. developed a policy of "containment" towards the expansion of communist influence. 
 [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Truman_Doctrine : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marshall_Plan ] 

 While the U.S. and Soviet Union engaged in "proxy wars" and developed powerful nuclear arsenals, the two countries avoided direct military conflict.[135]
 [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_proxy_wars  ] 

  source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States#History

The United States often opposed Third World movements - that it viewed as Soviet-sponsored -  and occasionally pursued direct action for "regime change" against left-wing governments, occasionally supporting authoritarian right-wing regimes.[136] 
EXAMPLE: [ https://washdiplomat.com/academics-say-u-s-interventions-to-force-regime-change-often-fail/ ]

American troops fought communist Chinese and North Korean forces in the Korean War of 1950–1953.[137] 

The Soviet Union's 1957 launch of the first artificial satellite and its 1961 launch of the first crewed spaceflight initiated a "Space Race" in which the United States became the first nation to land a man on the Moon in 1969.[137] 

  source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States#History 

The United States became increasingly involved in the Vietnam War (1955–1975), introducing combat forces in 1965.[138]

At home, the U.S. had experienced sustained economic expansion and a rapid growth of its population and middle class following World War II.  
 After a surge in female labor participation, especially in the 1970s, by 1985, the majority of women aged 16 and over were employed.[139] 

 Construction of the US Interstate Highway System transformed the nation's infrastructure over the following decades. [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interstate_Highway_System ]
 Millions moved from farms and inner cities to large suburban housing developments.[140][141] 

 In 1959, the United States formally expanded beyond the contiguous United States when the territories of Alaska and Hawaii became, respectively, the 49th and 50th states admitted into the Union.[142] 

  source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States#History 

The growing Civil Rights Movement used nonviolence to confront segregation and discrimination, with Martin Luther King Jr. becoming a prominent leader and figurehead.[143] 

A combination of court decisions and legislation, culminating in the Civil Rights Act of 1968, sought to end racial discrimination.[144][145][146] 

A US "counterculture" movement grew;  fueled by opposition to the Vietnam war, the Black Power movement, and the sexual revolution.[147]

The launch of a "War on Poverty" expanded entitlements and welfare spending, including the [ creation of Medicare and Medicaid] , 
two programs that provide health coverage to the elderly and poor, respectively, and the means-tested Food Stamp Program and Aid to Families with Dependent Children.[148]

  source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States#History

The 1970s and early 1980s saw the onset of "stagflation". 

 The United States supported Israel during the Yom Kippur War; in response, the country faced an oil embargo from OPEC nations, sparking the 1973 oil crisis. 
  This led to an awareness of American dependency on foreign supplies of oil ... research, fuel efficiency, etc.

- In 1979, President Jimmy Carter brokered a peace treaty between Egypt and Israel, marking the first time an Arab nation recognized Israeli existence.[relevant?] 

 https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/u-s-russia-detente-ends  <  JIMMY CARTER, AFGHANISTAN, RUSSIA

   source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States#History

  After his election, President Ronald Reagan responded to economic stagnation with free-market oriented reforms. [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reaganomics ]

 Following the collapse of détente, he [Reagan] abandoned "containment" and initiated the more aggressive "rollback" strategy towards the Soviet Union.[149][150] 
 [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rollback ]

The late 1980s brought a "thaw" in relations with the Soviet Union, and its collapse in 1991 finally ended the Cold War.[151][152][153] 
 
 This brought about unipolarity[154] with the U.S. unchallenged as the world's dominant superpower.[155]

 source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States#History 

  [Contemporary history ]   source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States#History

[ END] 

China History  :: 

Archaeological evidence suggests that early hominids inhabited China 2.25 million years ago.[37] The hominid fossils of Peking Man, a Homo erectus who used fire,[38] were discovered in a cave at Zhoukoudian near Beijing; they have been dated to between 680,000 and 780,000 years ago.[39] The fossilized teeth of Homo sapiens (dated to 125,000–80,000 years ago) have been discovered in Fuyan Cave in Dao County, Hunan.[40] Chinese proto-writing existed in Jiahu around 7000 BCE,[41] at Damaidi around 6000 BCE,[42] Dadiwan from 5800 to 5400 BCE, and Banpo dating from the 5th millennium BCE. Some scholars have suggested that the Jiahu symbols (7th millennium BCE) constituted the earliest Chinese writing system.[41]

Early dynastic rule

Yinxu, the ruins of the capital of the late Shang dynasty (14th century BCE)
According to Chinese tradition, the first dynasty was the Xia, which emerged around 2100 BCE.[43] The Xia dynasty marked the beginning of China's political system based on hereditary monarchies, or dynasties, which lasted for a millennium.[44] The dynasty was considered mythical by historians until scientific excavations found early Bronze Age sites at Erlitou, Henan in 1959.[45] It remains unclear whether these sites are the remains of the Xia dynasty or of another culture from the same period.[46] The succeeding Shang dynasty is the earliest to be confirmed by contemporary records.[47] The Shang ruled the plain of the Yellow River in eastern China from the 17th to the 11th century BCE.[48] Their oracle bone script (from c. 1500 BCE)[49][50] represents the oldest form of Chinese writing yet found[51] and is a direct ancestor of modern Chinese characters.[52]

The Shang was conquered by the Zhou, who ruled between the 11th and 5th centuries BCE, though centralized authority was slowly eroded by feudal warlords. Some principalities eventually emerged from the weakened Zhou, no longer fully obeyed the Zhou king, and continually waged war with each other in the 300-year Spring and Autumn period. By the time of the Warring States period of the 5th–3rd centuries BCE, there were only seven powerful states left.[53]

Imperial China

China's first emperor, Qin Shi Huang, is famed for having united the Warring States' walls to form the Great Wall of China.
- Most of the present structure, however, dates to the Ming dynasty.
The Warring States period ended in 221 BCE after the state of Qin conquered the other six kingdoms, reunited China and established the dominant order of autocracy. King Zheng of Qin proclaimed himself the First Emperor of the Qin dynasty. He enacted Qin's legalist reforms throughout China, notably the forced standardization of Chinese characters, measurements, road widths (i.e., cart axles' length), and currency. His dynasty also conquered the Yue tribes in Guangxi, Guangdong, and Vietnam.[54] The Qin dynasty lasted only fifteen years, falling soon after the First Emperor's death, as his harsh authoritarian policies led to widespread rebellion.[55][56]

Following a widespread civil war during which the imperial library at Xianyang was burned,[q] the Han dynasty emerged to rule China between 206 BCE and CE 220, creating a cultural identity among its populace still remembered in the ethnonym of the Han Chinese.[55][56] The Han expanded the empire's territory considerably, with military campaigns reaching Central Asia, Mongolia, South Korea, and Yunnan, and the recovery of Guangdong and northern Vietnam from Nanyue. Han involvement in Central Asia and Sogdia helped establish the land route of the Silk Road, replacing the earlier path over the Himalayas to India. Han China gradually became the largest economy of the ancient world.[58] Despite the Han's initial decentralization and the official abandonment of the Qin philosophy of Legalism in favor of Confucianism, Qin's legalist institutions and policies continued to be employed by the Han government and its successors.[59]

[ Map showing the expansion of Han dynasty in the 2nd century BC ]

After the end of the Han dynasty, a period of strife known as Three Kingdoms followed,[60] whose central figures were later immortalized in one of the Four Classics of Chinese literature. At its end, Wei was swiftly overthrown by the Jin dynasty. The Jin fell to civil war upon the ascension of a developmentally disabled emperor; the Five Barbarians then invaded and ruled northern China as the Sixteen States. The Xianbei unified them as the Northern Wei, whose Emperor Xiaowen reversed his predecessors' apartheid policies and enforced a drastic sinification on his subjects, largely integrating them into Chinese culture. In the south, the general Liu Yu secured the abdication of the Jin in favor of the Liu Song. The various successors of these states became known as the Northern and Southern dynasties, with the two areas finally reunited by the Sui in 581. The Sui restored the Han to power through China, reformed its agriculture, economy and imperial examination system, constructed the Grand Canal, and patronized Buddhism. However, they fell quickly when their conscription for public works and a failed war in northern Korea provoked widespread unrest.[61][62]

Under the succeeding Tang and Song dynasties, Chinese economy, technology, and culture entered a golden age.[63]

The Tang Empire retained control of the Western Regions and the Silk Road,[64] which brought traders to as far as Mesopotamia and the Horn of Africa,[65] and made the capital Chang'an a cosmopolitan urban center. However, it was devastated and weakened by the An Lushan Rebellion in the 8th century.[66] In 907, the Tang disintegrated completely when the local military governors became ungovernable. The Song dynasty ended the separatist situation in 960, leading to a balance of power between the Song and Khitan Liao. The Song was the first government in world history to issue paper money and the first Chinese polity to establish a permanent standing navy which was supported by the developed shipbuilding industry along with the sea trade.[67]

A detail from Along the River During the Qingming Festival, a 12th-century painting showing everyday life in the Song dynasty's capital, Bianjing (present-day Kaifeng)

Between the 10th and 11th centuries, the population of China doubled in size to around 100 million people, mostly because of the expansion of rice cultivation in central and southern China, and the production of abundant food surpluses. The Song dynasty also saw a revival of Confucianism, in response to the growth of Buddhism during the Tang,[68] and a flourishing of philosophy and the arts, as landscape art and porcelain were brought to new levels of maturity and complexity.[69][70] However, the military weakness of the Song army was observed by the Jurchen Jin dynasty. In 1127, Emperor Huizong of Song and the capital Bianjing were captured during the Jin–Song Wars. The remnants of the Song retreated to southern China.[71]

The 13th century brought the Mongol conquest of China. In 1271, the Mongol leader Kublai Khan established the Yuan dynasty; the Yuan conquered the last remnant of the Song dynasty in 1279. Before the Mongol invasion, the population of Song China was 120 million citizens; this was reduced to 60 million by the time of the census in 1300.[72] A peasant named Zhu Yuanzhang overthrew the Yuan in 1368 and founded the Ming dynasty as the Hongwu Emperor. Under the Ming dynasty, China enjoyed another golden age, developing one of the strongest navies in the world and a rich and prosperous economy amid a flourishing of art and culture. It was during this period that admiral Zheng He led the Ming treasure voyages throughout the Indian Ocean, reaching as far as East Africa.[73]

The Qing conquest of the Ming and expansion of the empire

In the early years of the Ming dynasty, China's capital was moved from Nanjing to Beijing. With the budding of capitalism, philosophers such as Wang Yangming further critiqued and expanded Neo-Confucianism with concepts of individualism and equality of four occupations.[74]

The scholar-official stratum became a supporting force of industry and commerce in the tax boycott movements, which, together with the famines and defense against Japanese invasions of Korea (1592–1598) and Manchu invasions led to an exhausted treasury.[75]

In 1644, Beijing was captured by a coalition of peasant rebel forces led by Li Zicheng. The Chongzhen Emperor committed suicide when the city fell. The Manchu Qing dynasty, then allied with Ming dynasty general Wu Sangui, overthrew Li's short-lived Shun dynasty and subsequently seized control of Beijing, which became the new capital of the Qing dynasty.[citation needed]

Late imperial
Main article: Qing dynasty

Further information: Century of humiliation, Opium Wars, First Sino-Japanese War, and Boxer Rebellion

A 19th-century depiction of the Taiping Rebellion (1850–1864)

The Qing dynasty, which lasted from 1644 until 1912, was the last imperial dynasty of China. Its conquest of the Ming (1618–1683) cost 25 million lives and the economy of China shrank drastically.[76] After the Southern Ming ended, the further conquest of the Dzungar Khanate added Mongolia, Tibet and Xinjiang to the empire.[77] The centralized autocracy was strengthened to crack down on anti-Qing sentiment with the policy of valuing agriculture and restraining commerce, the Haijin ("sea ban"), and ideological control as represented by the literary inquisition, causing social and technological stagnation.[78][79] In the mid-19th century, the dynasty experienced Western imperialism in the Opium Wars with Britain and France. China was forced to pay compensation, open treaty ports, allow extraterritoriality for foreign nationals, and cede Hong Kong to the British[80] under the 1842 Treaty of Nanking, the first of the Unequal Treaties. The First Sino-Japanese War (1894–1895) resulted in Qing China's loss of influence in the Korean Peninsula, as well as the cession of Taiwan to Japan.[81]

The Eight-Nation Alliance invaded China to defeat the anti-foreign Boxers and their Qing backers.
The image shows a celebration ceremony inside the Chinese imperial palace, the Forbidden City after the signing of the Boxer Protocol in 1901.
The Qing dynasty also began experiencing internal unrest in which tens of millions of people died, especially in the White Lotus Rebellion, the failed Taiping Rebellion that ravaged southern China in the 1850s and 1860s and the Dungan Revolt (1862–1877) in the northwest. The initial success of the Self-Strengthening Movement of the 1860s was frustrated by a series of military defeats in the 1880s and 1890s.[citation needed]

In the 19th century, the great Chinese diaspora began. Losses due to emigration were added to by conflicts and catastrophes such as the Northern Chinese Famine of 1876–1879, in which between 9 and 13 million people died.[82] The Guangxu Emperor drafted a reform plan in 1898 to establish a modern constitutional monarchy, but these plans were thwarted by the Empress Dowager Cixi. The ill-fated anti-foreign Boxer Rebellion of 1899–1901 further weakened the dynasty. Although Cixi sponsored a program of reforms, the Xinhai Revolution of 1911–1912 brought an end to the Qing dynasty and established the Republic of China.[83] Puyi, the last Emperor of China, abdicated in 1912.[84]

Republic (1912–1949)  Main article: Republic of China (1912–1949)
Further information: 1911 Revolution, Second Sino-Japanese War, Chinese Civil War, and Chinese Communist Revolution

Sun Yat-sen, the founding father of Republic of China, the first republic in Asia.

On 1 January 1912, the Republic of China was established, and Sun Yat-sen of the Kuomintang (the KMT or Nationalist Party) was proclaimed provisional president.[85] On 12 February 1912, regent Empress Dowager Longyu sealed the imperial abdication decree on behalf of 4 year old Puyi, the last emperor of China, ending 5,000 years of monarchy in China.[86] In March 1912, the presidency was given to Yuan Shikai, a former Qing general who in 1915 proclaimed himself Emperor of China. In the face of popular condemnation and opposition from his own Beiyang Army, he was forced to abdicate and re-establish the republic in 1916.[87]

After Yuan Shikai's death in 1916, China was politically fragmented. Its Beijing-based government was internationally recognized but virtually powerless; regional warlords controlled most of its territory.[88][89] In the late 1920s, the Kuomintang, under Chiang Kai-shek, the then Principal of the Republic of China Military Academy, was able to reunify the country under its own control with a series of deft military and political manoeuvrings, known collectively as the Northern Expedition.[90][91] The Kuomintang moved the nation's capital to Nanjing and implemented "political tutelage", an intermediate stage of political development outlined in Sun Yat-sen's San-min program for transforming China into a modern democratic state.[92][93] The political division in China made it difficult for Chiang to battle the communist People's Liberation Army (PLA), against whom the Kuomintang had been warring since 1927 in the Chinese Civil War. This war continued successfully for the Kuomintang, especially after the PLA retreated in the Long March, until Japanese aggression and the 1936 Xi'an Incident forced Chiang to confront Imperial Japan.[94]

Chiang Kai-shek and Mao Zedong toasting together in 1946 following the end of World War II
The Second Sino-Japanese War (1937–1945), a theater of World War II, forced an uneasy alliance between the Kuomintang and the PLA. Japanese forces committed numerous war atrocities against the civilian population; in all, as many as 20 million Chinese civilians died.[95] An estimated 40,000 to 300,000 Chinese were massacred in the city of Nanjing alone during the Japanese occupation.[96] During the war, China, along with the UK, the United States, and the Soviet Union, were referred to as "trusteeship of the powerful"[97] and were recognized as the Allied "Big Four" in the Declaration by United Nations.[98][99] Along with the other three great powers, China was one of the four major Allies of World War II, and was later considered one of the primary victors in the war.[100][101] After the surrender of Japan in 1945, Taiwan, including the Pescadores, was returned to Chinese control. China emerged victorious but war-ravaged and financially drained. The continued distrust between the Kuomintang and the Communists led to the resumption of civil war. Constitutional rule was established in 1947, but because of the ongoing unrest, many provisions of the ROC constitution were never implemented in mainland China.[102]

People's Republic (1949–present)
Main article: History of the People's Republic of China
Further information: Proclamation of the People's Republic of China, Retreat of the Republic of China to Taiwan, Cultural Revolution, and Chinese economic reform

Mao Zedong proclaiming the establishment of the PRC in 1949.
Major combat in the Chinese Civil War ended in 1949 with the Communist Party in control of most of mainland China, and the Kuomintang retreating offshore to Taiwan, reducing its territory to only Taiwan, Hainan, and their surrounding islands. On 1 October 1949, Communist Party of China Chairman Mao Zedong formally proclaimed the establishment of the People's Republic of China at the new nation's founding ceremony and inaugural military parade in Tiananmen Square, Beijing.[103][104] In 1950, the People's Liberation Army captured Hainan from the ROC[105] and incorporated Tibet.[106] However, remaining Kuomintang forces continued to wage an insurgency in western China throughout the 1950s.[107]

Deng Xiaoping with U.S. President Jimmy Carter in 1979 

The government consolidated its popularity among the peasants through land reform, which included the execution of between 1 and 2 million landlords.[108] China developed an independent industrial system and its own nuclear weapons.[109] The Chinese population increased from 550 million in 1950 to 900 million in 1974.[110] However, the Great Leap Forward, an idealistic massive reform project, resulted in an estimated 15 to 35 million deaths between 1958 and 1961, mostly from starvation.[111][112][113] In 1966, Mao and his allies launched the Cultural Revolution, sparking a decade of political recrimination and social upheaval that lasted until Mao's death in 1976. In October 1971, the PRC replaced the Republic in the United Nations, and took its seat as a permanent member of the Security Council.[114]

After Mao's death, the Gang of Four was quickly arrested by Hua Guofeng and held responsible for the excesses of the Cultural Revolution. Elder Deng Xiaoping took power in 1978, and instituted significant economic reforms. The Party loosened governmental control over citizens' personal lives, and the communes were gradually disbanded in favor of working contracted to households. This marked China's transition from a planned economy to a mixed economy with an increasingly open-market environment.[115] China adopted its current constitution on 4 December 1982. In 1989, the suppression of student protests in Tiananmen Square brought condemnations and sanctions against the Chinese government from various foreign countries.[116]

Seal of the People's Government of the People's Republic of China, the national seal of the state used between 1949 and 1959
Jiang Zemin, Li Peng and Zhu Rongji led the nation in the 1990s. Under their administration, China's economic performance pulled an estimated 150 million peasants out of poverty and sustained an average annual gross domestic product growth rate of 11.2%.[117][118] The country joined the World Trade Organization in 2001, and maintained its high rate of economic growth under Hu Jintao and Wen Jiabao's leadership in the 2000s. However, the growth also severely impacted the country's resources and environment,[119][120] and caused major social displacement.[121][122]

Chinese Communist Party general secretary Xi Jinping has ruled since 2012 and has pursued large-scale efforts to reform China's economy [123][124] (which has suffered from structural instabilities and slowing growth),[125][126][127] and has also reformed the one-child policy and penal system,[128] as well as instituting a vast anti corruption crackdown.[129] In 2013, China initiated the Belt and Road Initiative, a global infrastructure investment project.[130] The COVID-19 pandemic broke out in Wuhan, Hubei in 2019.[131][132]

On 1 July 2021, the People's Republic of China celebrated the 100th anniversary of the establishment of the Communist Party of China
 (first of the Two Centenaries) with a huge gathering in Tiananmen Square and cultural artistic performance in Beijing National Stadium in Beijing.[133]
 

Geography