1860
Charleston, South Carolina, SC · On map
Abraham Lincoln won the 1860 election on a platform of halting the expansion of slavery, which prompted immediate Southern responses[6]. Shortly after the election, slave states began seceding to form the Confederacy, with South Carolina being the first to secede in December 1860[6]. This chain of events directly led to the Civil War beginning when Confederate forces attacked Fort Sumter, marking the culmination of decades of conflict over slavery expansion.
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