Introduction
The American Civil War began when Confederate artillery fired on Fort Sumter at 4:30 a.m. on April 12, 1861. That is how the war started, but it is not what caused the war. The war came about due to economic, social, and political factors that collided during the 1860 elections, factors that led to Southern secession, and eventually — perhaps inevitably — to armed conflict.
The root cause of the war was slavery. If the founding fathers of the United States had abolished slavery within the constitution, there would never have been an American Civil War. Unfortunately, the concept that the war had its roots in slavery has led to the simplistic notion that the Union was against slavery and the Confederacy was for slavery, and — by extension — the people of the Union were for freeing African-Americans held in human bondage and the people of the Confederacy was for enslaving them. That is not true. Few Northerners would have risked, or sacrificed, their lives to free the slaves. Those advocating the abolition of slavery outright were in the minority, and many of those who wanted to halt the expansion of slavery did so for economic — even racist — reasons. Southern attitude toward slavery is more problematic. Support for slavery was strong in the Confederacy, in spite of the fact that most Southern soldiers could not afford slaves. Support for slavery in the South was not unanimous among whites, while some believed that to maintain slavery the Southern states would have to remain within the Union.
This essay explores the cause of the war, from the roots of secessionism in the late 18th century to the events that led to open conflict in 1861. It also explores the reasons men on both sides of the conflict fought each other.
Social Change in the United States
The Industrial Revolution in the United States
The Industrial Revolution, which hit the United States in the latter portion of the 18th century, changed the distribution of labour between urban and rural areas throughout the world. Unskilled jobs became more plentiful in the cities. In effect, as the demand for labour increased the workforce began migrating from farms to cities. The increased demand for labour resulted in social changes, including changes in workers rights and property ownership rights. With a more mobile workforce (one that wasn't tied to the land, as it had been under the feudal system), came a growing emphasis on personal liberty, social mobility, and free (that is, not indentured) labour.
The Industrial Revolution did not affect all areas of the United States equally. Population densities meant that the Northeast of the country was best prepared for industry. The great cities of the Northeast were all within close proximity. The need to move food and goods for large numbers of people coupled to the relatively short distances between cities dictated that railways would first appear in this part of the country. The South and West had smaller population densities. These areas focused on agriculture. The Industrial Revolution allowed these areas to flourish — for instance, the cotton economy of the Southwest depended on Mississippi steam boats — but they didn't have the large pool of labourers in relatively compact areas that factories demanded.
By the middle of the 19th century the Industrial Revolution had divided the country into four socioeconomic groups: the industrial Northeast, the free farmland of the Northwest, the established agrarian states of the Southeast, and the cotton economy of the Southwest. Each had their different characteristics and different political goals.
The Rise of Abolitionism
Secularism flourished among educated Americans at the end of the 18th century. At the beginning of the 19th century came a religious revival known as the Second Great Awakening. Social activism accompanied this revival with emphasis on the right to own property, the opportunity for advancement, and the right to control one's own labour. These were all attitudes brought about by the Industrial Revolution. This integrated well with the concept of personal liberty, which was a basis of American democracy.
There was no more obvious an antithesis to personal liberty than slavery. Slavery, by definition, meant that the slave was without personal liberty. As reformers in the North preached personal liberty and free labour, they saw the Southern agrarian elite as an obvious opponent. Many of the social reformers in the North embraced the abolition of slavery, initiating the abolitionist movement.
These same abolitionist reformers also saw Irish Catholic workers in the North as opponents. They believed the poor Northern factory workers — many of them Irish immigrants — were responsible for their own plight. These immigrants were poor or criminally inclined because they spent too much money on alcohol, or they had so little self control that they were producing too many babies to feed. Child labourers were either the unfortunate victims of their parents' failings, or they were infected by the same failings and so they did not work hard enough to escape their fate. Free labour required ambition and personal control, coinciding with the kind of sexual and moral control preached by puritan evangelists. Poor immigrants, most of whom were Roman Catholic, were thus morally inferior.
What these reformers missed (or blatantly ignored) was the fact that factory workers were paid wages just barely above the level of subsistence and worked very long hours. Alcoholism and a population explosion went hand-in-hand with an impoverished population that worked too hard and didn't have the resources to escape.
Not all social reformers saw things the same way as the strict abolitionists. People who were considered radicals at the time began forming labour unions to improve the plight of the worker. These reformers did not see eye-to-eye with the abolitionists. This conflict explains the several decades of tension between Irish immigrants and the abolitionist movement. Nevertheless, the reformers and the abolitionists increased the call for more personal liberty, and more equality, for the lower classes. This sentiment did not rise as quickly or as loudly in the rural South.
The "Free Soil" Movement
The "free soil" movement was against slavery, but for what today would be considered very racist reasons. The rural North had a strong economy. Steam boats and railroads offered Northern farmers and craftsmen the ability to send their goods to market throughout the country, as well as overseas. The first half of the 19th century was a time of prosperity for the rural North, but that prosperity was threatened. A growing number of free blacks were moving into the North and competing with white workers and farmers for jobs and land. African-Americans were often willing — or forced — to accept a lower wage. Higher paid whites had trouble competing with lower paid blacks.
But blacks couldn't vote! Therefore, several Northern states enacted "Black Codes" to control the opportunities for, and the movement of, free black Americans.
At the same time, the West was opening up for settlement. White Northerners feared an expansion of slavery into the Western territories. Free (white) farmers and craftsmen felt they could not compete with slave owners. A slave owner had less overhead than the farmer who had to hire people to work for him. Slavery was seen as an unfair business advantage against those who had no interest in owning another human being.
The movement that formed to preserve small towns and rural areas of the North for free white workers was known as the "free soil" movement. They were against the expansion of slavery into western territories, but they were also against allowing free blacks and others — such as Chinese immigrants in the Oregon territory — into those regions.
The "free soil" forces coalesced in 1847 and formed the Free Soil Party in 1848. The party attracted former members of the abolitionist Liberty Party, extreme anti-slavery members of the Whig Party, and the pro-Van Buren faction of the New York Democratic Party, known as the Barnburners. They opposed the expansion of slavery into territories in which it did not already exist, including Oregon and the territories taken from Mexico in the Mexican-American War. The territories would be for free whites, not for minorities and certainly not for slave owners.
The Free Soil Party nominated former president Martin Van Buren to run for president in 1848, with Charles Francis Adams as his running mate. The party failed to win a single electoral vote in the election, but their presence was felt nonetheless. One of the party's leaders was Salmon P. Chase, who would later become Abraham Lincoln's Secretary of the Treasury from 1861 to 1864.
Changes in the Antebellum South
The U.S. North wasn't the only region of the country seeing the effects of the Industrial Revolution. The cotton gin was invented by Eli Whitney in 1793 (though some believe that at least the original concept was invented by Catherine Littlefield Greene; since women were not allowed to own patents at the time, she could not patent the invention under her name). It was a machine that allowed the separation of cotton fibre from seedpods and seeds. This invention revolutionized cotton farming by reducing the number of workers and the time required to process the cotton. This resulted in a huge boost in cotton production, which was largely centered in the Southwest United States. Steam driven technology exploded at the same time, allowing plantation owners access to more cotton markets via steamships, including the huge textile markets of Britain and France.
Even with the cotton gin, picking cotton was still a labour intensive activity. Plantation owners purchased slaves to pick the cotton (slaves were also bought to pick other crops, like indigo and tobacco). As the cotton economy flourished, so too did the trafficking in slaves. By 1860 slaves accounted for 19% of the nation's wealth, more than all the railroads and all the manufacturing in the nation combined.
Abolitionism grew in the North, causing the South to become fearful of losing what was to the Southern slave owner an indispensable resource. Abolitionism was seen as being anti-South, as only the South and some border states had slaves by the time the abolitionist movement gained real political power. This added to the schism caused by tariffs during the Nullification Crisis.
Out of a total white Southern population of six million in 1850, only about 350,000 owned slaves. Of those 350,000 about 7% owned 75% of the slaves. Clearly this small group of "slave magnates" had an overwhelming interest in the preservation of slavery. Outside of this small group were the smaller farmers, either with a small number of slaves or no slaves at all. They depended on the larger slave owners for access to cotton gins, for markets for their crops and livestock, and for loans. There were usually familial ties between the poorer farmers and the richer farmers. These conditions forged close connections between the middle class and the Southern "aristocracy" (or "plantocracy"). It was not surprising that the two classes had similar views on slavery.
Added to this mix was severe racism. Southerners had the same fear of free blacks stealing jobs from whites as white workers in the North. Southerners also feared free blacks would violently attack whites in revenge for years of oppression. While Northern protestant religious groups railed against the immorality of slavery, Southern preachers slanted biblical passages for their audiences, supplying a religious basis for white domination and black slavery. The moral fight between abolitionism and pro-slavery is what caused several protestant churches to split, forming the Southern denominations of those churches.
Though a small percentage of whites owned a significant number of slaves, a majority of the South believed the "peculiar institution" was necessary to preserve the peace, and that the right to own members of "lesser races" was morally justified. This contrasted with the social reformers of the North and, to a lesser extent, with the free-soilers of the Northwest.
Diverse Opinions on Slavery
A majority of Southerners believed in maintaining slavery, but not all of them believed in the institution. Likewise, not all calling for the abolition of slavery in the territories simply wanted to keep the territories for free white farmers. Opinions on slavery were quite diverse. There were folks North and South who thought slavery was immoral and should, eventually, be abolished. There were also folks North and South who used biblical passages to justify slavery.
What none but the most radical abolitionists wanted was immediate freedom for the slaves. There were fears in North America and Europe that wholesale abolition would be dangerous. They thought that freed slaves would riot and attack their former owners, or that they would flock North and steal manufacturing jobs from whites. Strident abolitionists like John Brown wanted slavery ended immediately. Moderate abolitionists — most with the "free-soil" agenda of keeping the Western territories for free white farmers — were content, for now, to keep slavery out of those territories. Moderate pro-slave politicians called for a balance between the number of slave states and the number of non-slave states in the Union, while radical slavery proponents wanted to see slavery as an option within all newly formed states.
The debate was over the expansion or containment of slavery; there was virtually no serious discussion in public about dismantling the "peculiar institution". Some pro-slavery Southerners argued in the late 1850s that the only way to preserve slavery was through the Union, that secession would stop its expansion into the territories claimed by the Union. As it turned out, this argument was correct. The Civil War ended slavery by 1865. It is highly unlikely that slavery would have been abolished by that date if the war had not occurred.
Mass Democracy
Industrialization changed the way democracy worked in the United States. Railroads and telegraph meant that a politician, or his representative, would make a speech in one town and word of that speech would reach the next town before the politician arrived there. Mechanical printing presses resulted in an explosion in newspaper circulation. No longer was it possible for a politician to promise something in one part of a state and then promise the exact opposite in another part of the state. A politician had to choose one side of an issue and stick with it.
Nineteenth century society favoured decision. Being undecided was considered "unmanly" (remember that only white men could vote). That left little room for compromise. A man was expected to decide strongly one way or another. Certainly the press followed this course. Newspapers were blatantly partisan, but without the ethical checks and balances that guide journalists of the late 20th and early 21st centuries.
At the same time, political activity became a form of entertainment. Political rallies could attract up to 50,000 people. Participation in politics was an important aspect of middle and upper class life.
Everyone (that is, every man) was expected to have an opinion, and every opinion had vocal opponents. Indecision was frowned upon. It was a time of strong, polarized opinions, a partisan press, and newly discovered form of fast communication (the telegraph).
There had been stability (some might say stagnation) in a two-party system with the Democratic-Republicans on one side and the Federalists on the other. The Whig Party formed in opposition to the policies of Andrew Jackson, with many of its members former Democratic-Republicans. The Democratic-Republicans loyal to Jackson reorganized themselves as the Democratic Party. Due to emerging regional differences, this stable two party system had dissolved by 1854. Several new political parties had appeared, including the Republican Party.
The United States entered into it's greatest period of political instability since the founding of the nation at the same time as opinions over slavery polarized.
