preview

Slavery During The Civil War

Better Essays

Cotton was the king of the South. It was bringing in large amounts of money as the textile industry in the North grew. Slavery was vital to the economic well-being of the South, and when the North began to question the “peculiar institution” of the South the wall of civility between the two sectionalized areas began to crumble. Due to the growing issue of slavery in the 1850s, the United States of America was in a state of total disarray and turmoil. The tension that had always existed between the North and South over the matter of slavery was no longer ignorable. As the United States expanded to the West, the status of slavery in the new states erupted in a violence that could no longer be controlled by sectionalism. The peace treaties that had worked in the past became Band-Aids over stab wounds. Southern states began to leave the United States of America to form the Confederate States of America and war was declared as the South fired onto the forts of the North. The Civil War was caused directly by the issue of slavery; the fugitive slave act in the Compromise of 1850, Dred Scott v. Sandford, and Bleeding Kansas prove that slavery was the key factor in the eruption of the nation. In 1832, Dr. John Emerson purchased a thirty year old male slave, Dred Scott, from the Blow family; Emerson moved from the southern territory of Alabama into the Northern territory of Illinois with Dred Scott in tow (VanderVelde 4). “Slavery did exist in Illinois, yet Emerson had brought his

Get Access