The Declaration of Independence the Civil War - Essay Example

?The Civil War Was Inevitable Was the Civil War Repressible? After the Declaration of Independence the Civil War was not repressible. The Civil War, after the Declaration of Independence, was inevitable. In the opening lines of the Declaration of Independence are these words: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”1 It is not possible to interpret any form of slavery as one that exemplifies the stated truths of The Declaration of Independence. How can one hold another as a slave if he believes that they are created equal? How can it be shown that slavery allows, in any degree, the “pursuit of happiness? Where in slavery can a slave be found to have “liberty”? Signs of the coming Civil War in the United States were clearly seen decades before the Battle at Fort Sumter began on April 12, 1861. According to the Library of Congress Civil War Desk Reference, page 53, “Long before the Civil War, the terms “North” and “South” had acquired fixed geographic and cultural certainty for Americans. In 1767, two English astronomers, Charles Mason and Jeremiah Dixon, completed a survey that marked what had been a disputed boundary between Pennsylvania and Maryland. By the early nineteenth century, the line of demarcation had become more significant; most free states were entirely north of the Mason-Dixon line (parts of Illinois, Indiana, New Jersey, and Ohio fell below it) and most slave states were entirely to the south of it. Although this remains to a large extent accurate, there were some deviations from it during the war.”2 The two sections of the United States, the North and the South, were very different geographically, economically, culturally and to a large part, politically. Yet they shared many commonalities. Both spoke the same English language. Both had gone through the Revolutionary War. Both groups were predominately Protestant. Both were fiercely independent. However, there were stark differences as well. Again, to quote from The Library of Congress Civil War Desk Reference, “the regional differences were striking and had become the subject of frequent comment. The ethnic diversity of New York and Pennsylvania contrasted with the ethnic homogeneity in most of the white south; the religious practices of the Puritan in New England differed greatly from those of the Anglicans in Virginia. Some 1,200 miles separated Maine in the North from Florida in the South, but slavery could make the two sections appear worlds apart. The slave system in the South and the free labor capitalism of the North produced two distinct economic philosophies that shaded Americans’ views of those living on the opposite side of the Mason-Dixon Line”.3 Some say that lack of understanding from either side caused men to willing take up arms against each other, even against family members. Many argue that cultural and political issues propelled the nation into civil war. Indeed they certainly had their part. Politically the North was predominately Republican while the South was predominately Democrat. But as Page Smith said in his book, Trial by Fire, “The civil war took place because the Southern states felt that they could no longer tolerate their status as members of the Union.” (pg1)4 Smith goes on to discard any suggestion that economy, sectionalism or politics, had any legitimate influence on launching the bloodiest conflict in our nation’s history. He emphatically claims that the institution of slavery and, more specifically, the determination of the North to limit it and the South to extend it were the exact and specific cause of the war. In determining whether or not the Civil War was repressible this question must be asked. Would there have been a Civil War if slavery had not existed in the United States? Stephen Oakes, in his The Approaching Fury, speaks of a major issue regarding slaves and slave states which was current news in 1820.5 The issue involves the state of Missouri and the fight to bring Missouri into the union as a slave state. The fight was intensely bitter. If congress had allowed Missouri admission as a slave holding state that would have given the pro-slave faction a one vote margin. That in turn would have opened the way for the expansion of slavery into the rest of the Louisiana Purchase region. Therefore the issue concerning Federal involvement was raising its massive, menacing head a full forty years before the attack on Fort Sumter. However, the concern was two-fold. The expansion of slavery was one issue. The involvement of Congress was another issue. Neither issue was secondary to the other. What is important to note is not that there was strong pressure to expand slavery as early as 1820, but that the question on Federal involvement in state or territorial affairs was being raised. Various bills were being promoted in congress regarding the problem in Missouri. One would make a law disallowing anyone from taking any more slaves into Missouri and all slaves from that time forth, born in Missouri would be freed when they became twenty-five years old. The opponents of this bill, almost all from slaveholding states, cried foul! “Congress has no power to free the slaves of a territory; the Federal government is limited to powers explicitly enumerated in the constitution, and the power to emancipate is not one of them.”6 The approach of the Civil War was unstoppable due to the fact that the two sides were so far apart on the issue of slavery. There are other concerns which would be directly affected by the war. In 1820 the United States was the largest producer of cotton in the world. Of major importance in supporting the argument presented in this paper is the understanding of the mutually shared industry surrounding cotton production and cotton processing between the North and the South. When Eli Whitney invented the cotton gin in 1793 he sparked a revolution in the cotton industry and caused pressure for a labor system that had slavery at its core. Mass production of cotton was mutually profitable for the North and the South. The South could grow it and ship it North. The North could then process it into fabric and sell the products domestically and by export. The cotton gin drastically cut the time to separate the cotton from the cotton seed. Therefore, because of the cotton gin, mass production of cotton was in demand. Growing the desired large quantities called for an immense work force. The need was for a cheap work force. That need was met by slaves. The politics and now the economy were jointly, and some would say, unintentionally, contributing to the need of slave labor. Slave labor contributed to another area found in Southern society. The planters, owners of plantations, were evolving into the new aristocracy. Life on the plantations of the wealthy, successful planters was very pleasant, if you were white. Little or no labor was done by the family of the plantation owner. On most plantations, on all of the wealthy ones, the owners of the land lived in very large, ornately built homes that many would describe as being somewhere between lavish and extravagant. Palatial is a term used by some to describe some of the homes on the plantations. The plantations were often thousands of acres in size. And those thousands of acres throughout the south were farmed by hundreds of thousands of slaves. Their crops were varied but no one would contest that “cotton was king”. “Southern plantation life is the story of a system of production. From the first, the region depended on the cultivation of crops for sale. Tobacco and rice in the 18th Century, and "King Cotton" in the 19th set the pace for the region's economy. Each of these crops demanded an enormous supply of cheap labor. Faced with a shortage of workers, plantation owners imported vast numbers of slaves. The slave became the distinguishing feature of plantation life.” 7 By 1820, southern plantations were producing more raw cotton than any other country in the world. To increase output, some slave owners created the gang-labor system that saw African American slaves placed under constant supervision, ever under the threat of violence if their working pace lagged. During the pre-civil war era the lower Mississippi valley, running from Mississippi Alabama and Georgia was called the “black belt”.8 The slave owners, especially the wealthiest, lived lavish, aristocratic lives. The rich whites enjoyed this status. Describing slavery as a positive good replaced describing it as necessary evil. Arguments even went so far as to proclaim slavery to be good for the inferior blacks. It gave them security and showed them a glimpse of civilized life.9 In Nevins Ordeal of the Union pg 37 he says this about people visiting America from England. “All visitors quickly found, if they did not already know, that two Americas really existed: the North and the South. Most of the go-ahead spirit and nearly all of the ‘we-can-whip-universal-nature’ brag was concentrated in the North; much of the leisure, courtliness, and pride in the South. Disliking slavery, heat, and inferior travel facilities most travelers imitated Dickens in avoiding at least the cotton states. But those who like Thackeray, pressed courageously into the lower south, usually felt rewarded. If there was poverty, there was also picturesqueness. If blacks were sad to look upon, the whites seemed more English in aspect and more old world in outlook than the Northerners.”10 However, even as this society, so filled with contrast, was developing, the winds of change were getting stronger and stronger. Probably the number one trait that all America took pride in at that time was democracy. The South interpreted the accusations and impositions of the North as a threat to their sovereign rights as States. They saw their democratic system being threatened. It is true that much effort was going into spreading propaganda. The people on both sides of the Mason-Dixon line were very involved in making sure their philosophies were well known. The South’s response could be labeled indignant, perhaps even self-righteous. The North’s response could be labeled, in their own eyes, as noble. Speeches filled with hate and bitterness were given on both sides. The authors of Mississippi’s “Declaration of Immediate Causes” for instance, claimed that the North “advocates negro equality, socially and politically, and promotes insurrection and incendiarism in our midst. Alabama’s Leroy Pope Walker summarized that Republican rule would cost Southerners first, “our property”, “then our liberty,” and finally “the sacred purity of our daughters.11 Was the Civil War repressible? It was not. Forces had been put in motion long before the first official shots were fired. Was the reason for the cultural? It was not. Was the reason political? It was a hotly debated topic for years before the war started. But Politics was not the reason for the war. Was the reason for the war “states rights”? Some would still say yes. Most would say no. Was the reason economic? Economics were certainly involved. Was the reason for the war slavery? Would there have been a Civil War in America if slavery did not exist? A hymn by Whittier answers for us. What gives the wheat-field blades of steel? What points the rebel cannon? What sets the roaring rabble’s heel On the old star-spangled pennon? What breaks the oath Of men O’ the South? What whets his knife For the Union’s life? Hark to the answer: Slavery!12 Notes Read More