Timeline of events leading to the American Civil War colonial period in Virginia, slavery had been a part of the socioeconomic system of British North America and was recognized in the Thirteen Colonies at the time of the United States' Declaration of Independence (1776). Since then, events and statements by politicians and others brought forth differences, tensions and divisions between the people of the slave states of the Southern United States and the people of the free states of the Northern United States (including Western states) over the topics of slavery. The large underlying issue from which other issues developed was whether slavery should be retained and even expanded
Japanese declaration of war on the United States and the British Empire each month throughout the war (until Japan surrendered in 1945), to re-affirm the resolve for the war. Below is the text to the declaration of the war with the boldened texts released in the name of the Emperor of Japan: The document declares the war against the United States and British Empire, discusses their presumed disruptive actions against Empire of Japan's foreign policy and states that all avenues for averting war have been exhausted from the Government of Japan. Japan had invaded much of East Asia to create what they called the "Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere", now largely viewed