Civil War Dbq

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The cause of the Civil War is difficult to diagnose entirely. Historian James G. Randall puts forward an agreeable argument that the Civil War stemmed from the divide between the secessionists and abolitionists. Both parties exaggerated the differences between the two sections and would lead the Union towards war. Randall claims that the North and South were fundamentally alike and slavery was not the fundamental cause of the war. These differences regarding the issue of slavery would be then exaggerated by the sections to create a background of distrust too great to overcome. The abolitionists, in particular, turned political differences over slavery to be settled by compromise. The inability to compromise would be driven by the rift

between radical political leaders from both the North and South. Abolitionist and proslavery southerners divided the political system and the Union by fueling sectional tensions for political gain. Both the North and South were different societies because of the institution of slavery. The inability to compromise was driven and influenced by four structural factors. According to Donald, these four factors led to misunderstandings and further isolated the sections. One factor was the issue of slavery which is linked with territorial expansion after the Mexican war. Constitutional ambiguity also made it difficult to determine whether if slavery was an infinite institution or not. The South remained static while the North was modernizing at a faster rate. The demise of the second-party system and extinction of the Whigs led to the realignment of the political system and gave rise to a sectional party, the Republicans.
America prior to the war was not precisely a homogenous society, and both North and South had different societies based on the virtue of slavery. However, the two sections shared a national government, identical cultural values and norms excluding slavery, and modes of commerce. Fundamentally, the two remained together even as slavery served as a divisive issue in the nation. The North and South relied on each other economically. However, “the North enjoyed the lion’s share of the profits.” Both the South and North failed to acknowledge the mutually beneficial relationship between the two. The North and South also accused each other of using the federal government to advance their interests. This is evident in Thomas Kettell’s book Southern Wealth and Northern Profits where he portrays the North as an economic leech. This idea of economic inequality would be used to intensify sectional tensions for political gain. The South felt that they were losing power in the Union and this is evident in the debates of the issue of slavery in the new territories.
The issue of slavery and territorial expansion became irresolvable between the two sections.

The issue was not slavery but rather a power struggle between the North and South. Laws that interfered with the South’s right to expand and own slaves were an issue. The South sought to assert their authority over the federal government, but the issue of territorial expansion threatened Southern states rights and autonomy. The Wilmot Proviso opposed the further expansion of slavery as a result of the Mexican War and stated that “The future greatness and glory of this Republic demands that the progress of domestic slavery should be arrested now and forever.” David Wilmot’s amendment represented the growing resentment towards the South and proslavery policies. His policy was supported by Northern Congressmen but rejected by a Southern-dominated Senate. This would intensify sectional tensions. Debates over the territories followed. Henry Clay offered an interesting perspective and insisted that slavery was unsustainable in the new territories because of the climate and soil. He opposed the Wilmot Proviso and stated that “California and New Mexico, I hold slavery to be excluded from those territories by a law even superior to that which admits and sanctions it in Texas. I mean the law of nature, of physical geography, the law of the formation of the earth.” Clay clashed with Northern antislavery leaders and denounced for betraying the Northerners. John Calhoun also heavily opposed the

Wilmot Proviso and proposed that the only way to save the Union was for Southerners to secede. His speech states, “the Union has already been destroyed by agitation, in the only way it can be, by sundering and weakening the cords which bind it together.” This speech was attractive to Southerners who wanted to uphold slavery because of his ideas of states rights. Calhoun’s speech would influence the Nashville Convention. The goal of the convention was secession, but it failed. However, the secession movement in the South remained dormant. Both sections were each concerned with the balance of power which was determined by both the amount of land on which slavery was allowed and the number of free states and slave states. The Compromise of 1850 would alleviate the sectionalism for a period until the Kansas-Nebraska Act. Overall, the debate condensed sectionalism, but most speakers deepened the split by criticizing the opposite section.
Stephen Douglas’ is one radical who used the differences between both sections for his own political gain. The Kansas-Nebraska Act repealed the Missouri Compromise. This compromise established boundaries for the North and South. Douglas intended to win southern support and win a Democratic presidential nomination bid. This would lead to a chain reaction. The free states did not take this lightly. Salmon P. Chase of Ohio denounced the Kansas-Nebraska Act in the Appeal of the Independent Democrats in Congress to the People of the United States.” He “warned the country that freedom and union were in peril, and encouraged all Christians to rise in protest against this “enormous crime.” He also emphasized the differences between the South and North. He stated to the Senate that “Freedom…national; slavery is only local and sectional.” This is one example of how both parties overstated the differences between the two sections. Southerners supported the Kansas-Nebraska Act as a “measure…just in regards to the rights of the South, and reasonable in its operation and effect.” This divided the Whigs and led to defeat of Democrats in the fall election of 1854, and many northerners believed that the Kansas-Nebraska Act was a “piece of legislation…part of a Slave Power plot to spread slavery throughout the North.”
The Kansas-Nebraska Act led to the question of Kansas.

Was it a free state or not? Abolitionist promoted immigration into Kansas. Civil unrest was prevalent in Kansas. Former senator David Atchison led a group of seventeen hundred armed individuals from Missouri to cast fraudulent votes. He also stated, “if that ain’t enough, we can send five hundred—enough to kill every God-damned abolitionist in the territory.” The abolitionist movement had racist motives as well. The free-state individuals of Kansas organized a constitutional convention in Topeka that discouraged slavery in Kansas but also free blacks. They wanted to keep Kansas predominantly white. This would be the beginning of many conflicts between the two movements led by significant individuals like Governor Wilson Shannon. The kerfuffle between Charles Sumner and Preston Brooks which involved “caning” highlighted the dislike between the sections. This heightened the North’s “antisouthernism” while the Southerners celebrated Brooks. What followed was radical expressions of sectionalism led by extremists by both sections. An example is Ohio Congressman Joshua Giddings’ speech to the House in 1855 describing the South as tyrannical. The Harpers Ferry Invasion was also believed by the South to be orchestrated and influenced by the Republican Party despite a failed senatorial investigation. The rift between both sections was built on the issue of slavery. Both sections used the issue of slavery not to better and free

the enslaved but for political gain and maintain the balance of power.
The election of 1860 marked a devastating blow to the South and its political power. Many southerners believed that Lincoln’s election jeopardized the South’s influence within the Union where they already felt like second-class citizen. Historian James G. Randall offers an agreeable argument. The Civil War was not inevitable and was rather driven by the actions and motives of radical political leaders from both the North and South. Both the South and North benefitted economically from a thriving relationship between the two. However, the power dynamics always shifted toward the North. The North wanted to uphold this supremacy, and often the two misjudged each other and “southerners refused to admit that the North was making a major contribution to their economy, while northerners sometimes failed to see how much of their profit depended on the southern trade and how their factories depend on turning cotton into textiles.” Both “Lincoln and the Republican party were committed to not interfering with slavery in the South” and were open to negotiations. Secession was unnecessary because “if the Southern states remained in the Union the Democrats would command a majority in the Senate, the opposition could block appointments and refuse appropriations, and the incoming administration would be “hand-cuffed, powerless to do harm…” It is also important to note that slavery was unsustainable in the newly-acquired territories. Nonetheless, both sections did little to fix the divide but rather exaggerated and used the differences on the issue of slavery for political gain and eventually led the Union to the Civil War.