The events leading up to the Civil War included the Missouri Compromise of 1820, which aimed to balance slave and free states, and the Compromise of 1850, which included the controversial Fugitive Slave Act. The Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854 further inflamed tensions by allowing popular sovereignty to determine slavery in new territories. The Dred Scott decision of 1857 and the rise of abolitionist sentiments, exemplified by figures like Harriet Beecher Stowe and John Brown, intensified the divide. Ultimately, the election of Abraham Lincoln in 1860, viewed by many Southern states as a threat to slavery, prompted secession and the onset of the Civil War.
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