Causes_of_Civil_War

Causes of the Civil War Imagine yourself in the situation to have been drafted into the U.S military, you have to fight in showers of gunfire, march miles and miles of road to a battlefield and stand in pools of dead bodies who were your comrades. To have to fight enemies who are your countrymen, your friends, even your own family. Wouldn’t you like to know the reasons behind this' Wouldn’t you like to know how this could be prevented' Wouldn’t you want to know why you are killing your own countrymen' The Civil War was ultimately inevitable; there were too many different divides between the North and the South for there to be peace and this was why the Civil War had to be fought. The American Civil War was caused by political issues, economic differences, and differing opinions on slavery between the North and South. The Civil War was one of the bloodiest battles in the U.S it had many nicknames such as the “Brothers War”, the “War of Rebellion,” and the “War between States” (Goff). This war between the North and the South began on April 12, 1861 when the South declared attack on Fort Sumter. Fort Sumter was an important port that was owned by the Union. In this battle the South bombarded missiles at the Union naval ships and the fort. After hours and hours of bombardment the North surrendered the port to the South, there were no casualties (Goff). This marked the beginning of the civil war. The Union had many advantages when they entered the Civil War. They had a stronger naval military, a larger population, and they had much more resources than the South. The only advantages that the Confederates had was they had many skilled veteran generals and because they were fighting on homeland (Faragher 164). There were many significant battles in the Civil War two of these battles were the Battles of Gettysburg and the Battle of Antietam. In the Battle of Gettysburg many Union soldiers’ lives were lost; this was also the battle in which Abraham Lincoln declared the Emancipation Proclamation which stated that any slaves in states of rebellion will be granted freedom by January of 1864. The Battle of Antietam was important because this war was the bloodiest single battle in the Civil War with more than 23,000 casualties. It was also significant because if the South won it would convince the British to side with the South so they could defeat the Union together (Faragher 163). However it the North won the war it would tear apart the idea that the South had any chance of winning the war. After these major battles the Civil War began to decline to its end and on April 9, 1865 Commander Lee surrenders to Commander Grant at the Appomattox Court House. (Courthouse located in Virginia). This gesture of surrender is what marks the end of the Civil War where President Lee surrenders his Northern Virginia army. This truce was interesting because in this truce the North did not convict the South as prisoners or as traitors but they merely welcomed the South as old friends. (Phillips). One of the main reasons that the South wanted to fight the Civil War was because the Southern states were afraid that they would lose their rights to keep slaves inside their state borders. (Faragher 163) The Southerners believed that slavery should be allowed in the Southern states and that the South should be allowed to keep slaves in their homes. However the North believed that slavery was immorally wrong and that people should not be treated as property. On top of that the Northerners wanted to keep the Union intact inside of dividing it into two separate nations. (Phillips)(Faragher163). This caused the North and the South to grow anxious about each other’s opinions and gave the South doubt if they should stay in the union or not. If the South stayed in the Union they would feel like they were being ostracized and ignored. However if the South left the Union it would mean war against the powerful North. An issue between states’ rights and federal rights was also a reason that caused the Civil War. Andrew Jackson had enforced the Tariff of 1832 in which every state had to pay taxes however South Carolina felt this was unfair so South Carolina threatened to secede from the Union. However John Calhoun, senator of South Carolina did not want South Carolina to secede from the Union so he suggested another alternative and gave the South Carolina the choice to nullify laws (Craig). Therefore South Carolina formed a theory known as State’s Rights in which states had to nullified laws from the federal government that they believed was unconstitutional. This led to the nullification crisis, South Carolina started nullifying laws that believed were unconstitutional or because it did not benefit them. However the federal government did not like the fact that states could just nullify laws that they did not like so they decided to stop them. After the government stopped South Carolina from the ability to mark laws unconstitutional South Carolina threatened to secede from the Union. This also gave the idea to the other states in the South that they were no longer respected as part of the Union and that they would be better of creating an own nation of their own (Calhoun qtd in Stampp 40). Therefore many southern states considered the idea of secession which means the formal separation from an alliance or federation. Besides the conflict of which government should be superior the North and the South also had a huge difference in terms of economy. (Phillips). Ever since Eli Whitney’s invention of the cotton gin in the 1790s the South had based their economy in which cotton was their primary income. It was the South’s money crop and this money crop needed lots of slave labor to help gather up cotton. The South then started to build their economy into an agricultural economy. The North on the other hand contrasted with the South widely because instead of an agricultural economy they had an industrial economy. The North did not need vast amounts of slaves to help them with their economy. Therefore the North did not approve of the idea of slave labor in the South because firstly the North would have to complete economically with the South’s slave labor and secondly they thought that using slaves for labor and to define them as property was immorally wrong and that they had to stop it. (Faragher163). Political tension between the North and the South was also a reason which led to the Civil War. The North and the South had conflict because of political interests the House of Representatives and the Senate was very important to the control of the American Federal Government (Faragher 163). The North and the South both wanted to gain control of these two branches. If the North had control they would use this opportunity to save the African Americans from slavery. On the other hand if the South gained control of the House or Representatives and the Senate they would enforce slavery and make slavery into a law. As tension rose between the North and South it finally broke when Abraham Lincoln rose to presidency on November 6, 1860. Lincoln was the first Republican to become President of the United States and he was on the side of the North. Lincoln had declared earlier in in his presidency campaign that he would not meddle with slavery where it already existed. However he strongly opposed slavery in states where it didn’t exist yet. (Symonds) This caused many southern states to wonder why one would stay in the Union if the President opposed of what they were doing so many southern states seceded from the Union, (Calhoun qtd in Stampp 40).these states included South Carolina, Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Texas, Virginia, Arkansas, Tennessee, and North Carolina. These states believed that they were no longer respected nor needed in the Union and they believed that the other states in the Union did not respect them nor did they think them as part of their nation (Calhoun qtd in Stampp 40). Thus these states formed the Confederacy (led by President Jefferson Davis) who fought the Union for their independence as a separate nation. It may be argued that the Civil War could have been prevented by other means however if these means were used the outcome would not be better than the Civil War being fought. For example there were many compromises made between the North and the South. The first compromise made by the North was the Missouri Compromise. This compromise was made in 1820 and it stated that states above the 36◦30’ mark would be anti-slavery states, states that were below this mark would be pro-slavery states. This also allowed slavery in the Southern States and slavery prohibited in the Northern States. Another compromise was the compromise of 1850 which stated that California would 1be a free state, but the fugitive slave act (an act that stated if a slave ran away from his owner and ran to a free state he would be captured and brought back to his owner) was also reinforced so that both sides benefited from this compromise. This compromise kept peace in the North and the South; however this compromise quickly fell apart after the issuing of the Kansas-Nebraska act. The Kansas-Nebraska act opened up two lands (Kansas and Nebraska) for settlement and allowed the settlers to decide whether or not there state would be pro-slavery or anti-slavery. This act basically undid the Missouri Compromise and made it invalid because it allowed slavery in the North. President Lincoln himself believed that this would not be healthy for the nation because first of all it would cause hatred between the North and the South (Symonds). Secondly there will be imbalance between the two sides because one believed that slavery is allowed and the other believed otherwise. The other prevention that could have been made was if the Union accepted the secession of the Southern States in 1860 and allowed them form a new nation known as the Confederates States of America. However this prevention also has many flaws first because America would have much less land, less power, and less resources. Secondly it would have many disputes on where land borders should be set and maybe lead to another war. Lastly if this prevention was made then America would not have such economic and political success in the world today. In conclusion, because of the deep political, economic, and social divides, in addition to the failure of compromise attempts, the civil war was thus inevitable. The differences between the North and the South were too big and this meant that in order to settle out ideas once and for all they needed to fight a civil war. It may be argued that some prevention may be made but if this prevention was made then America would be a far weaker nation than it is today.