This major controversy over the runaway slaves sparked the beginning of the Civil War. The northerners felt that slavery was an act that was in opposition to the United States Constitution. The Constitution states that all people were entitled to their basic rights, to which the suspected runaway slaves were being denied. It was known that some blacks in the North were free, yet they were still being accused of being a runaway during this time of chaos.
Thus, the issues of pro-slavery and anti-slavery arose between the Southern Democrats and Northern Republicans in the 1850s. The North desired to halt the expansion of slavery into western territories while the South strongly opposed. These two opposing parties led to radical abolitionism in the North, William Henry Seward and John Brown, and extreme secessionism in the South, James Henry Hammond, and South Carolina Ordinance of Secession. Due to their strict ideologies regarding slavery, both parties could not compromise on the issue of the expansion of slavery. Therefore, according to Americans in the years prior to the Civil War, conflict was inevitable.
The American Civil War The American Civil War had made a major impact on the course of the nation's history. Slavery was a major factor in Southern and Northern USA's economy — the South had used slaves in cotton plantations, and the North relied on the South to provide cotton for them to manufacture and trade. However, in the Pre-Civil War era, people had started to gain a sense of morality to stop slavery. The Northerners believed in abolition, but the South had relied on slavery in order to grow. Tensions had built up between the two, until the South had decided to secede, or withdraw, from the Union.
They simply had not understood that the South truly believed they needed their slaves to accomplish all the work quotas on the plantation. By taking the "moral highroad", they were motivated by passion.... ... middle of paper ... ...n the North at Fort Sumter. Though they did seem to attempt to avoid war, the inevitability of it all was overwhelming. As their social beliefs on slavery were dramatically different, westward expansion was creating a rise in tension, and Spot's Resolution, the Wilmot Proviso, and Election of 1860 made the war inevitable. Both sides were passionate with their beliefs, creating a rough start to the situation.
If these two battles had been wins for the Confederates instead of losses, the war could have had a completely different result. The Civil War decided what kind of country America would be; would it be a slave nation or a free nation? This war occurred due to differences in the free and slave states wanting to prohibit slavery in territories
One way I knew was because of the talk of slavery. During the time of the war, slavery was seen as a good and bad thing. The North was against the idea of slavery and did anything to try to abolish it, while the South supported slavery strongly. Seeing as slavery brought in good labor and economic privileges to the South, I can see why they would support it. What brought both sides into conflict would be the way Southerners treated slaves.
The South felt that the North was trying to destroy the southern way of life. The North on the other hand, had become more successful in industry and didn’t seem to understand the importance of slavery in the South. The South’s entire society and social structure was based on slavery and they were not willing to end the entire system. The South argued that slaves had their place at... ... middle of paper ... ...neration of politicians that were too dedicated to their own cause and system of beliefs. There were many reasons that the Civil War broke out.
Slavery was many things in America; it was a source of money and production for some, for others it was a terrible evil, but everyone’s opinion about slavery was slightly different. Slavery had been a necessity for most planation owners in the 1800s. Soon many northerners became aware of the cruelness involved with owning slaves and they rebelled against this practice. After the Civil War erupted, in 1861, soldiers had conflicting views about what they were fighting for. The differences in motives lead to the question, was the Civil War a war to end slavery?
“If anything, the opposition was more powerful and effective in the North than in the South.” (Why Did the Confederacy Lose?, pg 120) However the powerful opposition in the North w... ... middle of paper ... ...t and see it as a way to get rid of the moral burden of slavery. The conservative stands Lincoln originally held were broken with the Emancipation Proclamation, causing a massive internal struggle in the South to bring them down. This is why the North had already won to the extent of Lincoln’s conservative political stands. “Having taken an oath to preserve and defend the Constitution, which protected slavery, “I did not consider that I had a right to touch the ‘State’ institution of ‘Slavery’ until all other measures for restoring the Union had failed….”” (Who Freed The Slaves, pg 203) The attrition strategy was halted with the mental conversion of the war being a moral war and the internal divisions in the South would finally clinch victory for the North. However all other advantages were possessed by the North and therefore the North had won the Civil War before it began to the extent of Lincoln’s conservative political stands.
The American Civil War was a conflict over way of life. The Southern states depended upon the agriculture of the slaves, including cotton production. There were many reasons why the South wanted to separate from the union and there were also many reasons why the North wanted to maintain the Union. The main reason the South wanted to separate was to become an independent state. The Southerners did not want to get rid of their slavery system because it was critical to their e... ... middle of paper ... ... the main cause of the Civil War was slavery as shown by the Border War, John Brown’s Raid, and the novel Uncle Tom’s Cabin by Harriet Beecher.