The causes of the Civil War Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

The causes of the Civil War - Essay ExampleToday the American Civil War represents one of the most classic conflicts in the history of the United States. While the war itself only lasted from 1861-1865, the effects have been felt fundamentally throughout the United States since. In addition to enacting significant death tolls on both the Northern and Southern participants, the semipolitical ramifications of the conflict were truly revolutionary as they resulted in the emancipation of slaves throughout the country. While patently the Civil War was a direct result of then President Abraham Lincolns Emancipation Proclamation, declaring the abolishment of slavery, upon further inspection its top there are a number of complex causes behind the war. This essay considers the various causes to the Civil War in an attempt to gain a broader misgiving of their political implications. Perhaps the primary catalyst behind the Civil War was the economic differences between the Northern and So uthern states. While industrialization had enacted factory return and similar means of economic subsistence in the Northern states, the Southern states had evolved along a different path. Within the Southern regions, where the climate encouraged more coarse means of production, the economy had become almost entirely reliant on cotton production. Within this spectrum of existence, cheap labor was essential to ensure the economy functioned, so slavery became a key part of Southern existence. In addition to embracing slavery, the Northern modes of city-life encouraged greater means of interaction between the mixer classes. As a result, its argued that Northern regions evolved more progressive views on the social hierarchy, while the Southern regions remained in an antiquated order (Chambers 1999). This would led to contradictory perspectives that would eventually mount, greatly contributing to the opposing regions engaging in warfare. Another pivotal aspect that contributed to the s tart of the Civil War was planetary disagreements on political policy between the Northern and Southern regions. In these regards, one of the primary disagreements was between the belief the Southern belief that states should be primarily responsible for find out legal policy, versus the Northern view that the federal official government should be the primary decision maker in these matters. One of the primary arguments was advanced by politico John C Calhoun and referred to as nullification. This would give states the power to nullify laws that were passed by the Federal Government. As it became clear that such a measure would not be allowed, the Southern states moved toward seceding from the Union (Jones 1999). Ultimately, this would be a primary influence in bringing the Southern states to war. Another primary political issue was the righteous disagreement between individuals that supported slavery and those that were vehemently opposed to it. As slavery had become a long-entr enched aspect of the American economic landscape, even as growing concern over its immoral aspects mounted it became increasingly difficult to break the nation from these past practices. With the Louisiana Purchase, the United States gained a large bunch of land in the Western United States. The Federal Government deemed that new states admitted to the Union through this land would be free from slavery, placing increased pressure on the Southern states that embraced slavery to move toward abolishment. In addition to these aspects, tension began to emerge between the Southern and Northern states regarding slave laws. With laws such as the Compromise of 1850, Federal officials in southern and northern regions were forced to arrest fugitive slaves, or else themselves be arrested or fined (Gienapp 2001). Laws such as this caused tension with Northern individuals that believed these laws violated general human rights. In addition, there existed a growing abolitionist movement of politic al revolutionaries that sought to end slavery through protesting and sometimes violent means. These