Abolishing Slavery In The United States During The Civil War

Lincoln described the problem of ending slavery during the Civil war as “slippery” because the only time you can seize property from other nations is at war. Abolitionists wanted to take slaves—which were property—to the North so they could be free. However, Northerners had no authority to take slaves from the South because it wasn’t a nation. The federal government had no say in what state laws said unless an Amendment was passed, changing the Constitution, therefore nullifying state laws. Lincoln wanted to pass the 13th Amendment during the war because courts could decide that freed slaves would have to go back to slavery after it, making the Emancipation Proclamation have no

The South leaned away from the North and their beliefs. They Union (the North) and Confederacy (the South) then raised their gun against each other, and this started what we all know today as the Civil War. This war lasted four years straight of brutal fighting.

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.

Throughout the 1800s in America, slavery was a controversy between the north and the south. A Slave was one who was the property of another human being under law and was forced to obey them. The North felt that slavery was unfair and inhumane, whereas in the South, they felt as though slavery was crucial to their success. African American slaves were not allowed many rights: they were not allowed to testify in court against a white person, could not receive an education, or even sign contracts. Due to the brutality they faced each day, many slaves escaped with hopes to find freedom. The Underground Railroad, a system utilized by many runaway slaves to help them escape from the South to Canada, played a large role in the downfall of slavery and eventual abolition in the United States following the Civil War.

The American Civil War is also referred to as the war between the Northern and Southern States or the Rebellion War that began in 1861. Slavery was regarded as the main cause leading to the start of the war, as a high level of discrimination against the African Americans existed upon their arrival in the United States. The African Americans were either sold and traded by the elders in their villages or plucked from their native countries for a sometimes deadly transatlantic journey to serve wealthy southern families. They were not viewed as peers but as laborers and farmers. Americans who were rich and owned large plantations took the African Americans as their slaves. They suffered as if they were not worthy of compensation including working without pay and the standard consequence was lynching. During the period, they fought for their freedom, which was not given to them until the Civil War was fought. Consequently, they aligned themselves with the white men who were also soldiers in fighting for their freedom.

When the American Civil War began in the spring of 1861, those flocking to enlistment stations in states both north and south chiefly defined their cause as one of preservation. From Maine to Minnesota, young men joined up to preserve the Union. From Virginia to Texas, their future foes on the battlefield enlisted to preserve a social order, a social order at its core built on the institution of slavery and racial superiority . Secession had not been framed by prominent Southerners like Robert Toombs as a defensive measure to retain the fruits of the revolution against King George, a fight against those who sought to “intrique insurrection with all its nameless horrors.” (Toombs Speech) On January 1, 1863, when Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation went into effect the war became a revolution. The Union, the soldiers in blue fought to preserve could no longer exist. On every mile of soil, they would return to the Stars and Stripes from that moment on, the fabric of society would be irrevocably changed. In May of 1865, with the abolition of slavery engrained into the Constitution with the passage of the 13th Amendment, the Confederate armies of Lee and Johnston disbanded, and Lincoln dead of an assassin’s bullet; this change was the only certainty the torn fabric of the newly reunited states was left to be resown. Andrew Johnson and Southern Democrats believed the revolution of 1863 had gone far enough. Radical Republicans and African-Americans sought instead to bring it to

The Civil War, occurring between the years 1861 and 1865, was a devastating effect of sectionalism caused by the division of the country on the topic of slavery. Slavery impacted every aspect of the country, whether in the North or the South, though primarily in the South; major impacts were in the politics and economy of the early country ways which inevitably caused the Civil War.

The Southerners were fighting for a way of life they believed in. They thought England would help them because they used a lot of the cotton the South grew. Many Southerners deserted the army because they didn't have the things they needed for fighting. The Northerners had more men, more factories, and more weapons. The Northern military leaders were weaker than the Southern leaders. They later became as good with training. The Confederate favored slavery, felt they were fighting a second war of independence, made a living from small farms and plantations, wanted to lower taxes on goods,

Doctors and surgeons involved in the war were high in demand and were often sent to the battlefields untrained lacking the fundamentals of medicine and understanding of the importance of sanitation. “It was the tragedy of the era that medical knowledge of the 1860’s had not yet encompassed the use of sterile dressings, antiseptic surgery, and the recognition of the importance of sanitation and hygiene".2 This made it extremely difficult for doctors and surgeons treating injured soldiers because outbreaks of diseases spread quickly and easily due to lack of implementing basic sanitation rules. Things like changing clothes with vomit or bile on them, having clean water and food, sterilizing equipment, or keeping the treatment areas clean could have prevented many deaths. Unfortunately, because the doctors of the era were lacking the knowledge and expertise we have now, many soldiers with gunshot wounds would have had an amputation. Since there were no antibiotics during this time, it was easier to amputate an arm or leg than treat a gunshot wound to the area because the bullets were made from a solid ounce of lead and would shatter into many small pieces on impact. Performing amputations allowed for surgeons to move quickly from patient to patient and treat a larger number of soldiers increasing the number of lives

The book What They Fought for, is about the Civil war and the two sides involved. The two sides are Union and Confederate Armies. The Union is the north and the Confederate is the south. The union simply wanted to preserve the nation that the founding fathers bequeathed. The Confederate army was fighting for their independence. They believed the government was trying to take over and place too many rules on them. The Confederacy believed they should not have any restrictions. The Union wanted the country to be equal and whole. The ironic fact is that both sides were fighting for what the forefathers established, yet interpreted it in two completely different ways. The forefathers fought to be independent from British rule just as the Confederacy thought they were fighting. The forefathers also said “We the people of the united states…,” they wanted the nation to be united in their territories as a whole, just like the union believed. James McPherson does a great job of explaining both sides equally. Gerald Linderman and Reid Mitchell explained that soldiers at that time were not concerned with why they were fighting and only fought for their

The Confederates were Pro-Slavery and made up all the Southern States. The Union took up the Northern part of the U.S. and were Anti-Slavery. Robert E. Lee surrendered the last major Confederate Army to Ulysses S. Grant in 1865. Many still debate the actual cause of the Civil War, but many will state it was because of the difference of slavery between the North and the South. What started the end of the Civil War was when President Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation, stating that all slaves are free. With no workers or slaves helping the Confederates, they had no money or the power to go on through the war, as strong as they did in the beginning. A lot of slaves came up to the North to enlist into the Union Army to help free other captive slaves. Some stayed behind the rear of the Confederate Army to fight them from

Many people around the U.S sit in classrooms and learn about the Civil War. A lot of students are taught that the War was fought over Slavery, this is a misnomer. In spite of what we are taught in school, the Civil War was not just over Slavery, but also over a states right to choose by popular sovernity. The Definition of Popular Sovereignty is "

The Union and the Confederacy both believed they were fighting for a righteous and just cause. Abraham Lincoln’s election led to a fundamental shift in power that caused Southerners to fear for the welfare of their states. The south began to secede from the Union and many Northerners rejected the dissolvement of the Union. There were many reasons behind each side’s fighting in the Civil War. The first reason is slavery. The South was intent on preserving slavery, because it was “an ingrained part of their economy and way of life” (Thomas, 1). The North had no need for slavery because their economy was based on industrialization and many Northerners had moral reservations on slavery. While the South did not change their overall opinion about

The Civil War was one of the most trying moments in American history. Two opinions trying to outweigh each other caused citizens to choose to be united under two different flags instead of one. Both sides, the Union and the Confederacy, have their own interpretation of how the war happened. For example, a citizen (although their identity is unknown) noted that “The civil war was a whole new type of warfare. Unfortunately, the only way one could learn how to fight in this new type of war was to actually fight in this new type of war.”

The Civil War was a dark but necessary war in the history of the United States. It took awhile for things to calm down after the war but when it did the U.S. was very close north and south were with each other. The most common saying about the war now is brother against brother and thousands of people died. The South was worried about losing their possessions and freedoms so they resisted change. Northern ideas stated that everybody deserved to be free every man, woman, and child did not deserve to be shackled and worked to death.