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The Conflict Between The South And The North And North During Mid 19th Century

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The continuously irreconcilable conflicts, especially on slavery, between the South and the North during mid 19th century eventually led to the secession of the State of South Carolina and six other states after the election of Abraham Lincoln. When they felt their interests to be threatened, the white southerners used the secession as a powerful weapon to against emancipating slavery and to protect their own rights. Actually, the disagreements on the future of slavery were the chief reason causing the increasing gap between the South and the North, and there are three primary reasons why the seven southern states chose to secede from the Union after they realized they could not reach a satisfactory conclusion about slavery issues with the northern states. Firstly, the southerners believed that giving black slaves equal social and legal rights would eventually damage their own rights and and interests. The South argued that they were “fighting for home & liberty” (doc. 86, p. 285) and giving black slaves equal rights would at the same time damage the rights of the lower-class white people (Stephen A. Douglas, Speech in Chicago, July 9, 1858). Douglas insisted that the Constitution gave every states their own rights to decide whether or not to have slavery, and so making all states free states would disfranchise slaveholding states’ rights of self-government (Stephen A. Douglas, Speech in Chicago, July 9, 1858). That is, for southerners, the abolishment of slavery would

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