As you can see from this timeline, the issues surrounding the Civil War began almost at the start of the country and continued on long after the fighting had ceased.
1787	The Northwest Ordinance established the Ohio river as the boundary between slave and free territories.
1812	New England considers seceding from the Union after the election of Southern President James Madison.
1820	The Missouri Compromise sets the rules for the admission of slave and free states to the Union.
1832	President Andrew Jackson sends naval war ships to South Carolina to stop threats of secession.
1833	The American Anti-Slavery Society is formed.
1845	Frederick Douglass publishes his autobiography.
1848	The Free-Soil Party is formed, opposing slavery in new territories.
1851	Several secession attempts are defeated in the South.
1852	Harriet Beecher Stowe publishes Uncle Tom's Cabin.
1854	The Republican Party is formed.
1857	An economic depression causes the rift between the industrialized North and the agricultural South to widen.
1857	The Dred Scott decision is handed down by the Supreme Court.
1858	Lincoln debates Douglas.
1859	John Brown tries to start a widespread slave rebellion, but is captured and hanged.
1860	Abraham Lincoln wins the presidential election without even being on the ballot in the South.
1860	South Carolina secedes from the Union.
1861	Southern secession continues and the Confederate States of America is formed.
1861	Confederate troops capture Fort Sumter.
1861	Southern troops win at Bull Run.
1862	McClellan stops Lee at Antietam.
1862	South wins at Fredericksburg.
1863	The Emancipation Proclamation is issued.
1863	The tide turns in the war as the North wins at Gettysburg, Vicksburg and Chattanooga.
1863	The draft is instituted in the North, causing rioting.
1864	William Tecumseh Sherman captures Atlanta and Grant and Lee go head to head in Virginia.
1864	Lincoln is re-elected over McClellan.
1865	Robert E. Lee surrenders at Appomattox Courthouse.
1865	The Thirteenth Amendment abolishes slavery in the United States.
1865	Lincoln is assassinated by John Wilkes Booth at Ford's Theater and Andrew Johnson becomes President.
1866	The Fourteenth Amendment legislates equal rights and protections.
1867	Reconstruction begins.
1868	Andrew Johnson is impeached, but remains in office by one vote.
1868	Ulysses Grant is elected President.
1869	The Fifteenth Amendment gives black men the right to vote.
1877	Self-rule is restored to Southern states as Reconstruction fails due to corruption. The war is over, but the hatred continues.