free states
Pre-war northern regions
Free states are states or territories where slavery is prohibited by law.
The term is most associated with the antebellum United States, where free states stood in political opposition to slave states: The Missouri Compromise maintained balance between free states and slave states.
The designation shaped congressional representation, westward expansion debates, and ultimately the Civil War.
- republicsStates with elected governance
- abolitionistOpponent of human bondage
- abolition movementCampaign to end slavery
- emancipationRelease from legal bondage
- libertyAbsence of unjust constraint
democracy · sectionalism · independence · Kansas-Nebraska Act · Dred Scott · sovereignty · territorial expansion · Mason-Dixon Line · runaway slaves · anti-slavery movement · autonomy · Missouri Compromise · Harriet Tubman · US · Thirteenth Amendment · self-governance · Underground Railroad · Frederick Douglass
- Abolitionabolitionists, Frederick Douglass, abolitionist movement, Underground Railroad, Emancipation Proclamation
- Antebellum Americaantebellum era, Compromise of 1850, sectionalism, Fugitive Slave Act, Kansas-Nebraska Act
- Slavery EscapeUnderground Railroad, Harriet Tubman, Frederick Douglass, runaways, fugitives
- slave lawsslave code, slave codes, Code Noir, Fugitive Slave Act, pass laws
- American HistoryAmerican Revolution, Revolutionary War, colonial era, founding fathers, Declaration of Independence
- slaverychattel slavery, enslaved, slave, enslavement, slave traders
free statesvassal states
Territories subordinate to overlords
puppet states · occupied territories · colonies · dependencies · client states
free, state, states, freed, freeing, freely, freedom, freedoms, freer