War on Diplomacy
To the victor goes the spoils, and in war that comes with writing the ballad of history. The American Civil War was no different, and it has gone down as a moral war that pitted brother against brother, spilt the blood of hundreds of thousands Americans, and showed the world that all men truly were created equal. This war showed the world that America was willing to do whatever it took to be one nation, indivisible with liberty, and justice for all. The Confederates did not share this same worldview. For the South, there was nothing Civil about this war. This was a revolution. Misguided or not, the Southern States saw the Union as a tyrannical oppressor, and they wanted their freedom. They wanted to become a sovereign nation. They wanted to become the Confederate States of America. This was easier said than done. To the United States of America, the Confederacy was an insurrection that needed to be extinguished. The longer the war waged, the better suited the Union was to win the war. If the Confederate States were to survive, they needed international help. Badly. The primary reason for the Confederate States of America’s fervent attempts at diplomacy was to be recognized by European powers as a sovereign state. If this occurred, the Union’s plan to, “save the union,” because to the international community the South would be an independent state with the ability to receive aid and establish trade agreements (1861–1865 - Milestones - Office of the
The challenges that the Union and the Confederacy faced during the Civil War were very different. Critical weaknesses that seemed unfit for war, plagued the opposing American forces, and would serve to be a continuous obstacle that would need to be conquered by patriotism of the people, for their opposing views. To allow for both sides to be competitive, the efforts put forth had to mold to the varied needs of the armies by both the civilian population and their militaries. To the people in the south the similarity to the colonists in the Revolutionary War, was assimilated to their separatist cause in the Civil War and would be their drive to compete with the dominating Northern states. This mindset started the Confederacy in the Civil
Abraham Lincoln once stated “America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we falter and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves.” Abraham Lincoln is a hero for the citizens of America because his determination and courage to ending slavery even if it meant war caused peace in this nation. Slavery was the vital cause of the American Civil War. The north and the south both had their differences on how to run the country. People in the North believed in unity and that slavery should not exist because “all men are created equally.” On the other hand, the South believed in continuing slavery. People tried to talk it out and come to a middle ground after both sides compromising, however that didn’t work and caused war. Ideological differences were a vital role to making the American Civil War an inevitable event.
From the beginning of the war, the Confederacy placed great hope in being recognized and supported by Great Britain and France. European intervention in the conflict remained a strong possibility, but when it did occur, it was not in a way anticipated by either the Confederacy or the Union.
This fear of European intervention was the result of ties between the South and the economy in Europe. In the early stages of the Civil War, the European superpowers sympathized with the Confederacy and the Union feared they might even intervene and bring about Southern independence. Southern leaders believed that recognition and assistance from European countries would help the Confederacy win the war. While the
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
It can be said that the South began the Civil War from a winning position. They had declared their independence, formed their own country and government, and they needed only to keep what they already had. But this was a monumental task as the government was required to protect every inch of land within the Confederacy. As a new country, the Confederacy needed to demonstrate the ability to defend its own territory from external threat. Without this ability, the Confederacy could never receive the international recognition and support it needed to survive. Aside from this reason, the South also needed to protect the institution of slavery from outside interference. If the Northern armies took control of a particular Southern area, the Confederates felt that they would free all the slaves, thus destroying the entire structure of society and its economic value. Because of this, Jefferson Davis was forced to devise a flawed war strategy which attempted to preserve the entire Confederacy at the cost of concentrating his forces.
The Civil War that occurred was one of the darkest times in our history as a country. It was a time where there was a complete breakdown of social and political systems. Hundreds of thousands were killed and hundreds of thousands more were aversely affected. However, it was also a time of remembrance and significant moral progress. It is remembered as the turning point in American History and would be the foundation for the Civil Rights movement many years later.
The romanticized version of the Civil War creates a picture of the North versus the South with the North imposing on the South. However, after reading “The Making of a Confederate” by William L. Barney, one can see that subdivisions existed before the war was declared. The documents analyzed by Barney primarily focus on the experiences of Walter Lenoir, a southern confederate and a member of the planter elite. His experiences tell a vivid story of a passionate and strongly opinioned participant of the Civil War as well as demonstrate a noticeably different view involving his reasoning when choosing a side. Between analyzing this fantastic piece of literature and other resourceful documents from “Voices of Freedom” by Eric Foner, one
In the beginning when America was uniting and trying to form its official government the northern states and the southern states had already different greatly from each other. The North was industrializing and working on expanding west and the South was booming with farming and its famous cash crop. The North wanted to abolish slavery and the South did not. Since the North and South had so many differences and could not keep a steady compromise, heavy tensions arose between the North and the South which then caused the Southern states of America to decide to leave the American Union and create their own Southern Confederacy. This tore our nation apart. The American Civil War had begun and the very people that were once neighbors had each
The Confederates tried to compare their goals too those of the Patriots in 1776. They said they were fighting for the “sacred right to self-govern”. Lincoln presented the secession as an attack on popular government. The Union at the start of the war tried to force rebellious states back into the Union through a military campaign after diplomacy had failed.
During the mid-1800’s, the United States at that point could no longer find room to compromise on their views, and the secession of the South from the North showed the beginning of the Civil War. Both sides believed they were fighting for what was right: the Union for the equality and the Confederacy for the liberty of states’ rights. As there was virtually no room for compromise whatsoever, both sides perceived the other as trying to do what would work out to have the higher benefit for them. The sides both generally felt that the war was needed, but the Union felt that the war was a barrier in the growth of the country as a whole and the division was not how the country should stand.
They believed that slavery could not co-exist in a country that was founded on the ideology of freedom. However, they eventually found themselves fighting to help free the slaves rather than fighting for each other. The Confederate Army was fighting to maintain its grip on slavery as it was ever so important to their economy and way of life. They depended on it so greatly that they would be willing to risk their lives on order to hold on to it.
The American Civil War was a time wrought with peril. Families were split along party lines and took up arms against one another to fight for what they believed was right. Yet there was one group of people who had more to gain than any other present in the war, and that was the African American slave. This war was one of the biggest turning points in the morality of America all because of what happened to the slave in this war. They enlisted in the army, fought bravely, and after long last, gained their freedom.
In 1861, a horrific war began. Nobody had any idea that this war would become the deadliest war in American history. It wasn’t a regular war, it was a civil war opposing the Union in the North and the Confederate States in the South.. The Civil War cost many people’s lives on the battlefield and beyond. In addition it cost an extreme amount of money for the nation which possibly could have been avoided if the war had turned to happen a little differently.
The Civil War was a war between the union, and confederate states in the United States that occurred from 1861-1865. Many people believed that the Civil War was about slavery and southern states right to defend their states’ rights. The confederates were fighting for their liberty and independence under the leadership of Abraham Lincoln, who they felt was a tyrant. However, the union, was fighting to preserve their territory, that was created by their founding fathers from chaos and dismemberment. President Jefferson Davis believed that the civil war was based on the confederate rights to secede from the union. Jefferson also felt that Abraham Lincoln was to blamed for the start of the civil war, since he was against slavery. Lincoln’s intended goal was to preserve the union, he claimed slavery was not the reason. “If I could save the union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all slaves I would do it, and if I could slave it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that (Shi &Tindall, 2015, pg.465)”. Lincoln told everyone that if the southern states were to return to the union that slavery would still exist. However, many people believed that Lincoln wasn’t being truthful.