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Al- Barrak 1
Slavery/Political Problems
Which one caused the Civil War?
Or was it both?!
Nawar Al- Barrak
Mr. Greer/ Ms. Quark
Social Studies/ Language Arts
19 March 2006
Al- Barrak 2
Nawar Al- Barrak
Mr. Greer/ Ms. Quark
Social Studies/ Language Arts
19 March 2006
The Civil War: Was it caused by slavery?
Was slavery a more direct cause to the Civil War than states' rights? I think that slavery
was of a more direct cause to The Civil War than States' rights.
Slavery was the main issue that caused differences between the North and South because
the upper half of the U.S. opposed to slavery. After the Revolutionary War and after the U.S.
created the Constitution, America had the right to make its own laws. A law soon banned
slaves from being imported to the U.S. (Gay10). Many Southerners grew angry and started
smuggling slaves to places where it was still legal to have them. Soon, there were
abolitionists who teamed up with black leaders and helped free slaves. They even set up an
anti-slavery society (Gay 9-10). In the South, people had fewer cash crops than slaves. The
Southerners did not want to join a union were they would ban slavery because they needed
them in order to grow more crops to sell for a profit. It was soon clear to Northern delegates
that they had to guarantee slavery in order to keep the states from going into battle (Collier
10-11).
After the Constitution guaranteed slavery in the Southern colonies, the Northern colonies
grew more hatred towards this topic. Northerners didn’t want slavery to be permitted in the
middle lands (which would soon belong to all of America). This ended up in political battles
over slavery in new states. The whole thing ended up in a compromise which no side liked
but stopped them from more compromise.
Other may disagree and say that slavery wasn’t the main cause of the Civil War, rather it
was states right that caused the war. Many people barely even owned a slave: "The average
American had very little interest in slaves or slavery. Most Southerners were small farmers
that could not afford slaves. Most Northerners were small farmers or tradesman that had
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never even seen a slave!"(Leidner). When others say that slavery wasn’t the main cause of
the war, they use this quote to back them up because it says that most people in the 17001800s have never even seen a slave, so how can that be a reason for any war? Another
historian also says that "there are obviously many more factors involved in this conflict then
the politics of slavery. Was the confederacy, as a nation, pro-slavery? Yes it was. Does that
mean that the men fighting for the new nation fought because they did not want to see slavery
ended? No. the overwhelming majority of the men who fought [for the south] never owned a
single slave. To say that they went away to fight a war for someone else's right to own slaves
is not logical and not accurate" ("Day of Defeat Forums"). It is true that it's not logical for the
southerners to go to war over slavery, they went to war because they were mad at the tariffs
being set on them and that the state didn’t have a right to stop or do anything about it ("Day
of Defeat Forums"). The causes of the Civil War don't have a 'simple' reason. There are series
of conflicts that happened between the north and south to cause the war (Golden). What
motivated the southerners to go to war though were mostly based on states' rights.
Even though the southerners went to war thinking it was about states' rights, they still
had many conflicts based on slavery. It was one thing that, alongside state rights, motivated
them to go to war.
The leaders did not want to discuss this topic with the southerners because they knew
most of them didn’t own slaves. It divided up the north and south and became the most
explosive issue in the nation. People started moving to new territories and started voting on
whether or not it can be a 'free' or 'slave' state. This issue brought many conflicts among the
nation and soon led to violence in many parts of the country (Gay). The south wanted to
spread slavery into the new territories so that when the new states are created they would be
slave states. The north wanted the exact opposite for its economic society. They wanted to
decrease the spread of slavery to the new territories in order to support their moral issue and
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to try and control the southern's political power (Leinder). After Abraham Lincoln became
president, his dislike of slavery was much known. If Lincoln attempted to change the
arrangements and ban slavery, southern colonies would leave the Union. But Lincoln didn’t
want slavery to spread, so in 1860, 7 states from the south left the Union and started to form
their own nation (Collier 13). After the secession, Maine re-entered the Union as a 'free' state
and Missouri as a 'slave' state, slavery and politics became mixed. The southerners then
called for a balance. They wanted a slave state for every northern free one. After a long time,
this got fixed with the Compromise of 1850, which unfortunately, did not remove tensions
between the north and the south (Vandiver). After the secession, southern politicians began
to convince its people that the northerners were threatening their culture and way of life. The
northerners were trying to convince their people that the south would be insulting their
government if they ever seceded. Although they were both saying the truth, they weren't
saying the whole truth. Leaders form both sides knew if they told their people the war was
about slavery, no one would agree to fight in the war (soon to come) (Leidner). The Civil
War was mostly about slavery, but had a mixture of politics involved in it. The politicians
blamed the war on, states' right!
Yet, slavery did cause many different things, most of them leading to the Civil War. One
thing it caused was nationalism which was part of the conflict between the South and North.
If slavery had never existed, the war would have never happened. Slavery meant using
Africans to work without any wages or money, and what I also meant by more direct in my
first claim was that if it was never for slavery, the war wouldn’t have happened. One historian
had said that "slavery was the sole cause of the war," and added, "if the Negro had never been
brought to America, our Civil war could not have occurred"(Collier 10). Slavery however
wasn't the only cause of the war. There were many economic and political differences mixed
in that big conflict between the north and the south (Collier 10). When the armies were first
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formed before the war, only a small minority of the soldiers would say they were going to
war on the subject of slavery. However this may be true a historian had quoted: "had there
been no slavery, there would have been no war. Had there been no moral condemnation of
slavery, there would have been no war"(Leidner). Slavery as we can see here was a big part
of the Civil War, and was the underlying factor in other conflicts between the North and
South.
Conversely, people may state that taxes and the states' rights to nullify them where more
of a cause for the war than slavery was. For over 2 decades, the U.S. was caught in a crisis
where states wanted to leave the union and many other conflicts interfered with that as well.
This all started when the U.S. government decided to tax the southerners on industrial goods
that were imported from Europe. South Carolina where affected most by the tariff because
they were buying most of their goods from Europe (this eventually led to secession in 1861).
This was the first step the government took to anger them. The people of the south got very
angry at the rising taxes set by the government. They soon passed the Nullification Policy.
This stated that if there was any federal law that hurt South Carolina, they would ignore it,
and that's just what they did. President Andrew Jackson then set out a bill called the Force
Bill which said that the government had the right to send troops to any state that disobeyed
federal law. In 1883, a senator from Kentucky named Henry Clay came up with a
compromise that both sides agreed with. Everything was smoothed over with a compromise.
Even though everything was fixed, the politicians always talked about seceding and they
always looked for an excuse to, they finally did secede in 27 years ("Day of Defeat Forums").
That was another step the government did to anger the south.
Even though I have just stated the opposite of what I'm trying to prove, I still think that
many of the politicians went to war over slavery and what it was doing to the nation. Many
people may ask "was the war about slavery?" and they would get the answer that said
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"absolutely. If there had been no disagreement over the issue of slavery, the south would
probably not have discerned a threat to its culture and the southern politicians would have
much less likely to seek their right to secede'."(Leidner) Another good question people may
ask is why didn’t President Lincoln let the southerners secede peacefully? It wasn’t illegal
and South Carolina didn’t want to go to war. The answer is that it's because 70-80% of the
money of the U.S. government came directly from the south's taxes (Leidner). Lincoln stated
that if they let the south go and govern themselves, how would he fund his government. The
U|.S. government would base 70-80% of its income. Lincoln promised that he would force
the states on paying the tariffs and place troops in Fort Sumter. This started a small fight
between them (troops, and South Carolina). This opened many peoples' eyes and led a few
more countries to secede after South Carolina did. This all happened because fort Sumter was
believed to be south Carolinas property ("Day of Defeat Forums").
Even though Lincoln set out troops to the south, he still didn’t want to go to war, just like
many other moderate politicians. They all wanted slavery to die a slow inevitable death.
However, both the southerners and northerners wanted to go to war over this topic to fight for
their rights and for what they believe in. the leaders in all the states then had to make slavery
an indirect cause of war, because their people think they are going to war over the topic of
states' right. (Slavery caused the problem of states' rights). The south thought that the north
was threatening them, while the north thought the south was insulting them (Leinder).
Slavery obviously caused many conflicts between the north and the south, it may not have
been the only cause for war, but it was definitely the biggest and main cause of war, even
though the people thought that it was a background issue.
Slavery was the main cause for the Civil War, and was more direct to the war than states'
right or any other issue.
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Works Cited
Collier, and James Lincoln Collier. The Civil War 1860-1865. New York: Benchmark
Books, 2000. ---. Slavery and the Coming of the Civil War. New York:
Benchmark Books, 2000.
"Day of Defeat Forums- Causes of the American Civil War." 2004
<http://www.dayofdefeat.net/forums/printthread.php?s=5148706364d8 540b2 a40
153cddb28857&threadid=31852>
Gay, and Martin Gay. Civil War. New York: Twenty-first Century Book, A division of
Henry and Holt company inc. 1995.
Golden, Randy. The Civil War, Georgia's point of view. 2006.
<http://ngeorgia.com/history.why.html>
Leidner, Gordon. "Causes of the Civil War: A Balanced Answer." 2006. Great American
History. 11 Feb. 2006
<http://members.tripod.com/~greatamericanhistory/gr02013.htm>
Vandiver, Rank E. "Civil War, U.S." Academic American Encyclopedia. 1996 ed.