Causes of the Civil War Essay

The controversy over slaves ultimately led to the secession. Abraham Lincoln thinks slavery is wrong and he wants to stop it from spreading. Earlier, he had warned that slavery could separate a nation. In the 1860 election Lincoln is elected, but southerners are worried he will end slavery forever. Southern states start to secede because they are worried. First South Carolina succeeds, then North, Texas, and then Florida too. They give themselves a new name called the Confederate States of America. (Wise...)

Debates over which powers were rightly the states and rightly the federal governments were already tense and the question of whether slavery should or shouldn’t exist in the new territories of America, added on to the already strained relationship between the two sides. Document A describes this situation as a cup on the edge of the shelf, certain things almost pushing it over the edge such as the addition of new states being free or under a slavery economy. Many compromises were formed to try and keep states’ rights as well as keep power for the government. The south wanted to assert their authority over the federal government so they could abolish federal rights they didn’t support, this was

Slavery, as Abraham Lincoln often noted, was the root cause of the Civil War. Tensions over slavery dated back to the contradictory nature of the American Revolution of 1776 that resulted in a republic simultaneously committed to freedom for whites and bondage for blacks (Barney W., p. 61). Within years North and South reached the point at which compromise was not possible. At that time Civil War had been started.

Although some historians feel that the Civil War was a result of political blunders and that the issue of slavery did not cause the conflict, they ignore the two main causes. The expansion of slavery, and its entrance into the political scene.

Slavery, in the South and as well in the North, played a huge role of the culture of their societies. The North had a general belief in abolitionism, while the South opposed that idea. All the economic reasons led to the cultural differences. The South viewed slavery as a necessity to their economy. The North believed it was wrong to own a human being. The South contradicted this idea with the North’s use of cheap labor in its factories.

Slavery was one of the main factors sending the north and south into a raging war. There was more to than just slavery being abolished. Slavery being abolished to the south was like the government was taking abilities and money from them. Thus making them feel as if they were being done wrong. Also a majority of southerners were plantation owners needing slaves to work the farms so they could earn

¨Henry Clay was designed to settle the slavery question...The Compromise gave some satisfaction to both the North and South...It also included a strict fugitive slave law¨(Doc 1). Comprises cancel out other compromises constantly. The population only believe comprises are needed when relevant that is why people make new ones. The Missouri Compromise was relevant for 30 years which made sense during that time anything North was free. Anything south was a slave state. Then a person decided that was not enough and said the Population in that state gets to vote. Not everyone liked this because some of the Nation thought we can not just keep making compromises to hold us off from fighting. People believed that compromises were not gonna work, it was either we allow slavery or we do not.

Politically, slavery became one of those hot topic issues that politicians usually like to avoid speaking about because the country was divided into two different view points, pro-slavery and anti-slavery, and politicians wanted to be in everyone’s good graces to win come election time. However, when the argument came about weather or not newly inducted states could ban slavery or not, tensions rose in the government. This led to the Compromise of 1850, which allowed for stricter fugitive laws, but allowed California to be free, and New Mexico and Utah to make their decision based on popular sovereignty (the idea that the people of that state should choose). Politically, slavery left a whole mess of confusion for the new states. For example, in the Kansas- Nebraska act a railroad was to be built crossing over two new territories (Kansas and Nebraska) that allowed

Slavery was one of the biggest controversies in the United States for many years and many amendments and compromises were made because of it. It began with 3/5ths compromise of 1776 which declared all slaves were equivalent to 3/5th of a man. Then it progressed to the Compromise of 1850, which included 5 bills and admitted California to the United States as a free state, demonstrating how hard it was to please both sides. Next came the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854, otherwise known as Bleeding Kansas, a mini civil war regarding whether Kansas would be a free or slave state. These events along with many others began to create a large divide between north and south, ultimately leading to the biggest event of all, the Civil War which started in 1861.

The Civil War happened due to the many differences between the North and the South. For example economic, social, cultural and political differences. These all helped lead America to a Civil War. But to an extent, the most important cause was the fact there were many disagreements with states' rights versus federal rights.

The Union, backed by President Abraham Lincoln, was trying to abolish slavery. The South found this to be oppressive and used their right to "throw off such Government" and, one by one,

The secession of the South right after Abraham Lincoln’s election asserted that the South would not have slavery abolished (Corrick 21). Differences in views on slavery caused several states in the South to threaten to secede (Ushistory). The South supported slavery and held pro-slavery movements in several states, while the North believed that slavery was not constitutional and should be abolished (Civilwar.org; Cavendish). However, the North did not make any laws proclaiming the legality of slavery, but pushed the abolishment of slavery across the United States even further. Due to the secession of the southern states, tensions inevitably increased between the North and the South, thus leading to the start of the Civil War.

The North and the South were far from settling the slave issue. Another reason that caused the South to go to war was the difference in economic policies. The North was expanding more in the commercial and industrial side while the South was reliant on agriculture. Cities and factories had developed in the North and in the South, it was still staple producing and agrarian. The North’s industry was beginning to dominate its economy while the South was still mainly based on agriculture. The South only produced manufactured goods for consumption and the North were able to export manufactured goods. The taxes and tariff was unfair to the South. The Tariff Act of 1832 put high import fees on all European manufactured good, which was established to protect the Northern industries. The South’s reaction to the Act was a threat to secede from the Union. Railroads were also built to bond the northern tier of states. This made transportation easier in the Northeast than in the South. The Northeast traded with the West while the South can trade only by sea. " They wanted to promote the industry of the New England states, at the expense of the people of the South and their industry" In politics, the North had an advantage over the South. The North was more populated than the South and the South only counted slaves which was big part of their populations as * of a person. Since the House of Representative was based on population

The Civil War was fought over states rights and slavery, and whether slavery should be expanded into the western states. The compromises of 1820 and 50 was made to maintain the amount of free and slave states in Congress. Though with Lincoln’s election the southern states seceded due to the south believing he would abolish slavery, though only 1% of the south’s population owned slaves, however, most of the south was consumed by sectionalism which caused all of them to simply believe that slavery was their way of life. Thus when Lincoln was elected the southern states seceded, with the exception of the border states. Though when the south found out about Fort Sumter and didn’t allow supplies to enter a fight broke out and the civil war

The Civil War was caused by many reasons. The factors that were most responsible in causing the Civil War were the different views of the Constitution among the North and South, the Kansas-Nebraska Act, and the arrival of Lincoln as president. They caused immense destruction throughout the nation. If these factors were prevented, the United States could have been preserved and civil war could have never occurred.