Was The Civil War Really About Slavery

In the books The Civil War and Limits of Destruction by Mark E. Neely and The Destructive War by Charles Royster, both authors examine and question the destructiveness of the war. Neely is of the opinion that the Civil War was not a total war, while Royster argues the Civil War was the first modern war in American history. Both authors take different approaches to examining the war, as well as the role specific people played in the war. While both authors offer valid arguments to support their positions, there is no argument from either author that the Civil War had a major historical impact on our nation. While both books focus on the destructiveness of the Civil War, they differ not only on their view of the war as a total war, but also on the level of destruction, the approach used to support each authors point of view and the role that race played in the war.

Most people believe the Civil War was fought only over slavery and for abolition. Because of the speech Abraham Lincoln gave “The emancipation Proclamation,” it looks like the Civil War was a war about the morals of the nation. A war could not be stopped from happening once the Compromise of 1850 happened. The South was frantic to keep slavery going. Their whole economy was bases around the economics of slavery. The North did not realize that there was more than freeing the slaves to do with the war. The economics of the south was free labor caused by slavery. The black slave was a God sent for the Southern states in that it allowed them to make a great profit off their crops. William Freehling said, “Posterity thinks

Every moment in history begins with a cause. When it comes to the topic of the American Civil War, the specific causation has been debated by historians. Whatever the cause, the Civil War could be defined as the most gruesome war the United States has faced. With over 620,000 casualties, the Civil War of 1861 left America crippled with pain. Some Americans will promptly agree that this bloodshed was caused by slavery whereas others favor the idea of sectionalism; a term defined as the tendency to be more concerned with the interests of one’s own region than with the dilemmas of the country as a whole. The Progressive Historians believe economic differences between the North and the South, which were rooted in sectionalism, caused the war. On

The Civil War started in 1861, and though it was more than a century ago, there is still controversy and many questions arising about the subject. What were they really fighting over? Should the South have been able to succeed? What were the South’s true reasons for succeeding? Was the North’s only reason to go to war to free the slaves? Were Slaves truly treated as cruelly as we are to believe they were? Did the Abolitionists have other motives hidden behind tightly shut doors, which were not made public? These are only a few questions people want to know the answers to regarding the American’s War against themselves. Some of these questions are hard to give a definite answer to, and say what is exactly is

Americans primarily know the Civil War today as a war between northern states and southern states. The war began because each side perceived its liberty to be at risk. However, the fight underlined core differences between the beliefs of the North and South. “I could easily prove that almost all the differences which may be noticed between characters of the Americans in the Southern and in the Northern states have originated in slavery”, said Alexis De Tocqueville while visiting the United States in the 1800’s (Keene, p. 270). What began as a fight for liberty soon became a fight over the institution of slavery. Both sides had different interpretations of enslavement and the moral questions involved with the topic. The book What They Fought For addresses these questions in profound detail using letters from members of both the Union and Confederate army.

When Englishmen arrived at Jamestown they found a great land for farming. A few years later when the Englishmen decided to settle down at the new land, they grew a high-grade tobacco at the Chesapeake . It did not take long time for settlers to understand that they could pay their fines, debts, and taxes with tobacco, so they started to grow tobacco everywhere. In order to support economic growth and luxury living, Englishmen started to buy slaves, and made many of them to work on tobacco farms. Growing tobacco was a burdensome process. Slaves did not have any knowledge about their rights, or they were not able to take care of themselves without their owners. Most of

When it comes to looking back on how wars affected American citizens, we see that the Civil War was a specific preset of brutality. The meere premise from where the basis of the war originated shook to the core the morals of soldiers, civilians, and other participants/related parties, making them question what they believe divides humans, and tearing families and friends apart based on differences of opinion. The Civil War took a basic aspect of human living and turned it devastating. It led many into the position to kill with the proposition that you could hold power over someone based on the color of their skin, bringing them into the inhumane physical and psychological battlefield with one escalated notion: should

One of the long-term causes (1800s-1850s) of the American Civil War was Manifest Destiny and the United States acquiring of new territory. As of 1846 the United States had determined the status of slavery in all parts of the U.S. through either state law or the Louisiana Purchase (pg. 378). When the U.S. went to Mexico and gained all new territory, it reopened the controversy over the expansion of slavery. Solutions arose, like the Wilmot Proviso and Free Soil Appeal, which both prohibited slavery in the new territories acquired from Mexico, but both solutions failed. In 1850, California requested to be admitted to the Union as a free state and in doing so the slave trade, but not slavery, would be abolished in the nation’s capital; this

The Civil War was one of the most deadliest wars ever fought in history. Slavery was a direct influenced this war that shed so many lives. It was also an issue that divided the North and South. Many Southerners directly depended on slavery and so did their economy. The Southerner’s persistence on expanding slavery towards the West not only led to the war but also a moral crusade. The treatment of a race in this manner was unacceptable and called for immediate change which was the result of the American Civil War.

The Civil War was during 1861-1865 . It was known to be the first modern war . It had very high numbers in death compared to any other war .Because this war followed the Industrial revolution ,this war was the beginning of new technologies, new weapons It was a war fought between the North ( Union) and The South (Confederates). The North did not want to keep slavery but the South did . Slavery was the cause of the separation between the two.There were many laws that were created that started conflicts. Some of those law were created to oppress slaves.Which caused the problems to get bigger. Eventually the U.S. Congress passed the Fugitive Slave Act. The Fugitive Slave Act states that if a slave runaway they should be captured and returned to their masters. Section 8 of the Fugitive Slave Act states that anyone who caught a slave would receive a payment of five dollars . Then the Dredd vs. Scott Decision , a decision made by the supreme court , that African Americans, free or enslaved , were not allowed to be citizens . When Lincoln became President he gave freedom to slaves . And because of that decision the South seceded from the Union .

Thomas Jefferson had written a letter to senator John Holmes of maine, the letter that Thmas Jefferson wrote were about his fears of slaverys conflict would grow bigger and bring upon them a civil war. In the north abolitionist power grew more while in the south the people wanted to protect the institution of slavery. The united states had 11 slave states and 11 free states at the time but began to wonder if slavery should be allowed to expand in the land they had bought through the Louisiana purchase. Later on missouri wanted to join the union as a slave state which had began to cause some conflict so they had decided to set a precedent for the future states that would be in the land of the louisiana

The bloodiest war in American history occurred not in the present day, as one might expect, but in the mid-nineteenth century: the Civil War. To understand how roughly 2% of the population died in those tumultuous four years, one must first have a decent understanding of the events leading up to it and politics at the time. Various factors induced this mass bloodshed, but the largest amount center around one issue: slavery. Several decades into the Industrial Revolution, new technology like the cotton gin made the institution more profitable than ever- and more controversial than ever, as well. The issue had existed since the nation’s birth, and it would require a war to resolve it. It

Many think that Union states and Confederate states went to war for only one reason – slavery. While slavery was the main issue happening, there were many underlying problems that caused the tension between the north and south. Events such as The Missouri Compromise of 1820, Nat Turner’s Rebellion in 1831, Bleeding Kansas in 1854, Dred Scott Decision of 1857, and the election of Abraham Lincoln in 1860 are a few of the major causes of the Civil War. All these events made northern states open their eyes to how serious the situation was in southern states.

By all estimation, the American Civil War was considered to be the bloodiest and most gruesome war in American history. There are more US casualties involved in the American Civil War than US casualties in World War I & II, Korean, and Vietnam War combined. Historians have discussed possible causes that led to the greatest separation among the American people. It is important to recognize the true causes behind this separation so that history does not repeat itself. It is important to recognize the true cause behind this separation so that history of a civil war does not repeat itself. It is best to examine and understand one fundamental cause so that appropriate measures can be taken to prevent another repeat of the past. Current research as well as old documents demonstrate that the conflict over the legality of African American slaves is the main cause to such separation. However, many tend to overlook the economic reason that benefited both the northern and southern states. While it is clear that the Southern states benefited more from slavery due to the vastness of uninhabited land, both southern and northern states benefited in one way or another. Therefore, it makes one wonder: To what extent economic motive between the southern and northern states spurred the American civil war? Although causes like slavery, greed, and fear factor into the causes of the American Civil War, the economic motive between the southern and northern states spurred

The American Civil War was the bloodiest military conflict in American history leaving over 500 thousand dead and over 300 thousand wounded (Roark 543-543). One might ask, what caused such internal tension within the most powerful nation in the world? During the nineteenth century, America was an infant nation, but toppling the entire world with its social, political, and economic innovations. In addition, immigrants were migrating from their native land to live the American dream (Roark 405-407). Meanwhile, hundreds of thousand African slaves were being traded in the domestic slave trade throughout the American south. Separated from their family, living in inhumane conditions, and working countless hours for days straight, the issue of