Slavery: the Sole Cause of the Civil War

Unit 5 – Essay 3

        Slavery will always be remembered as one of this country’s greatest tragedies. Slavery was never going to be an event that would end with the stroke of a pen (Emancipation Proclamation), or an exchange of words. Despite the most heroic efforts of both white and black abolitionists, it would take a Civil War to force the hand of slave supporting southern confederate states. Therefore it is valid to say that “Despite the work of the Abolitionist Movement, the only way to end slavery was though violence.”
        Even though there were many differences between Northern States and Southern States, the belief of Southerners in slavery and more importantly, their refusal to give it up ultimately led to a violent clash known as the Civil War. Abraham Lincoln once said, during a meeting with a Committee of Colored Men on August 14th 1862, that the injustice of slavery was largely at fault for the commencement of Civil War. He went on to add, “It is not the Negro that is the cause of the war; it is the unwillingness on the part of the American people to do the race simple justice.” [1]
        Slavery had long been a problem in the United States. Movements in this country starting in the early 1800’s began to push for the end of it. In an effort to abolish slavery for good, the Abolitionist Movement was established. The movement began in the North, as opposed to the South, where slavery was praised. The goal of the abolitionists was to finally put an end to slavery completely.
        Under the influence of Evangelical religion, a growing realization of Southern commitment to slavery, and especially the British antislavery movement, American abolitionist found their ideological roots in the 1820’s.[2]   In 1831, after William Lloyd Garrison founded The Liberator abolitionist societies began to spring up across the North. By 1838 the year Frederick Douglass escaped from slavery, the movement had flooded Congress with petitions, experienced...