High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! The events which led to the origins of the American Civil War and to the Civil War itself may be considered in two time periods, the long term build up over many decades and the five-month build up to war in the period immediately after the election of Abraham Lincoln as President (in November 1860) and the fall of Fort Sumter (in April 1861). Over many years from almost the beginning of the colonial period in Virginia, events, occurrences, actions and statements by politicians and others in the United States brought about issues, differences, tensions and divisions between the leaders and people of the slave states of the Southern United States and the leaders and people of the free states of the Northern United States (including Western states). The big underlying issue from which other issues developed was whether slavery should be retained and even expanded to other areas or whether it should be contained and eventually abolished. Over many decades, these issues and divisions became increasingly irreconcilable and contentious. Events in the 1850s culminated with the election of the anti-slavery, but not yet abolitionist, Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States. This provoked the first round of State secessions as leaders of the Deep South States were unwilling to trust Lincoln not to move against slavery. This timeline briefly describes and links to narrative articles and references about many of the events and issues which historians recognize as causes of the Civil War. The series of events for the period from Lincoln's election on November 6, 1860 through the fall of Fort Sumter and Lincoln's call for volunteers to suppress the rebellion on the next day, April 15, 1861, led to the breaking point and civil war. The timeline shows many key events and statements in this crucial period immediately before hostilities began. The entries that finish this timeline include a few more events in the following months in 1861 that relate to the secession of four additional states and further initial actions and occurrences as both groups of states prepared for war. Four additional states, the Upper South States of (Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee and Arkansas) completed the formation of the Confederate States of America during this period. Their addition to the Confederacy insured a war would be prolonged and bloody because they contributed many men and resources to the Confederacy. Initially, only the seven Deep South States, with economies based on cotton (then in heavy European demand with rising prices) of Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, South Carolina and Texas seceded. President Lincoln's call for volunteers to suppress the rebellion pushed the four other Upper South States also to secede.