The Color That Cracked the Nation

The Bloodiest Divorce
Instructor: Professor Jason L. Malin
December 3, 2009
Author: Don Love

Don Love Oct. 29, 2009
U.S. History to Reconstl: 201-004
Jason L. Malin
History Essay #2

The Color That Cracked The Nation
      The multitude of events which led to the success of the Union of states we now know as the United States of America has historically teetered on the size of the continent in which they were formed upon. The vast amount of land which was available allowed for the colonization, farming, land development and gathering up of natural resources. These same reasons for its success would also be the reasons that caused a division between the sections known to all as the “North and the South”. Since the founding fathers and colonists had come to the new world, the west had always been the frontier and forward tip of the sword when it came to leading the way to the promised land, “biblically speaking of course”. As the needed acreage in the east had been slowly dispersed among growing families; the need for more land by the sons and daughters grew with the population boom of the old west. With the United States government’s continued acquisitions of new land either by purchases, treaties or by war, Americans were now able to move westward into a land of new beginnings and promise of a new future for all who followed their dreams..
      Shortly after the Louisiana Purchase was made by Jefferson from France, between 1800 and 1865 there was a large increase in the number of settlers migrating into westward territories. This migration began the long period of tensions and differences between the sections that would last through the Civil War. These tensions were due to the fact that the North wanted new territories that came into the union to be “free states;” meaning free from slavery. The rival southern states or sections wanted the new territories to be added as slave states so as to perpetuate their political purposes for economic...