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Causes Of The Civil War

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The Civil War was not an event that erupted overnight or something that no one had seen coming. It was a result of long stemming conflicts. “The road to civil war was complex and multi-faceted” (Wells, 1). These conflicts kept creating a divide amongst the states in the nation. The divide finally became so great, that the United States split into the Confederacy (South) and the Union (North), and fighting erupted. “ “The Civil War,” Randall Jimerson observes, “became a total war involving the entire population precisely because both sides fought for ideological principles. Compromise and surrender were unthinkable when so much was at stake.” ”(Finseth, 16). The root of the cause for the divide was slavery, but there were many other factors …show more content…

This argument was based off of the fact that the word slavery was never mentioned in the Constitution, therefore they did not feel that the federal government had a say in any matter. “Without employing the word “slavery”, the constitution…clearly endorsed the institution” (Wells, 10). They felt that it should be left up to the state to decide. By the terms slavery or slave(s), not being mentioned in the Constitution, the Constitution was seemingly trying to protect slavery and its slave holders. It also appeared to show that slavery was a domestic institution that was only to be controlled by the states, and that Congress and the federal government had no control in the matter. This issue on States’ rights created a division between the North and the South on the states’ right to own slaves. A second issue that arose and caused a big division in the nation was a result of the economy. The northern states operated off a total different form of economy than the southern states did. The North’s economy was built off industry, particularly the textile mills. “There was no place like it, either in terms of economic organization or urban development, in the South” (Gienapp, 4). While the South’s economy was built off farming. The south needed slaves to help tend the crops specifically the cotton, and with the invention of the cotton gin, the need for slaves greatly expanded.

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