After being a slave for so long it would be impossible to go back to Africa and not live like an American especially for those people who were either enslaved at a very young or born into slavery. I feel that the Native Americans would be more likely to revolt against the republicans than the African Americans because they already had their own way of living that they wouldn’t change for
On the other hand, the South was all for slavery. They depended on slaves for their agriculture and without them they would not be able to make a living. The South viewed slaves as property and not as people. They thought that The Fugitive Slave Act was only fair because they had bought them for money and that they should be returned. A typical day for a slave would be to wake up at sunrise and work in the fields.
These examples would explain how the lives of Southerners would be ruined and that the country would come to an end if slaves were freed. On page 22, Dew gave portions of a speech, by Governor John J. Petus of Mississippi that was given to the state legislature. In this speech he said, “Secession was the only way to avoid the blight of Black Republicans politics and free Negro morals”, he continued to say that if slaves were freed, Mississippi would become “a cesspool of vice, crime and infamy” (22). Petus was attempting to rationalize that the state would become a haven of criminals if slaves were freed. What he was more than likely concerned with was the idea of losing the vast revenue accrued from slavery, but he used scare tactics to get approval for secession.
William Seward was a leading anti-slavery figure who later became secretary of state in the Lincoln administration. He believed that the two systems held by the North and the South (free labour and slavery) were “incompatible”. He stated that eventually America would have to become either fully a free labour nation or a slaveholding nation. While not everyone felt so strongly about this in the North (many didn’t care about the slavery issue at all) it was a reason that soldiers and leaders on either side went to war and fought for (in the North to end it, in the South to defend it). Lincoln was of the opinion that while he would never accept the extension of slavery he would make no direct attempt to interfere with it where it existed.
It seems from a broader point of view that the North has gone through so much just for the Southern states of America to exist. It only makes sense that Northern leaders would feel angry and betrayed by hearing that those states that they have worked so hard to establish now want their own sense of independence. At the same time however, the South had more of a need for slaves than the north did. The agricultural part of the South employed slaves to tend the large plantations and perform other duties. Slavery was a natural part of the Southern economy even though very few of the population actually owned slaves.
It was all a plot to dehumanise us, to allow our oppressors to rationalise their actions, and reduced us slaves to animal property- as implied by the term “ chattel slavery. " This made our masters perceive us as inhuman property, and made us perceive ourselves as inhuman property as well. I still wonder, why must the southern states of America’s economy revolve around agriculture and slavery? Even after the industrial revolutions impact on the Northern states, why must the Southern state appear oblivious to the urbanisation. Was it because Thomas Jefferson heavily idealised agrarian farming, or is it impudence?
He was particularly not very fond of Thomas Jefferson, who he thought to be a racist. In his “Appeal in Four Articles” we can detect the tone and seriousness in his voice right away. This is obviously not a topic he takes lightly. He blasts the institution of slavery right away when he says, “But we, (coloured people) and our children are brutes!! and of course are and ought to be slaves to the American people and their children forever“ ( Walker 792).
The fear of slave rebellion distracted both the Southern slaveholder and the Northern invader. The Confederate government never used them as soldiers, but it did make them go into labor brigades to build fortifications, dig latrines, and haul supplies. As the war went on, Southern manpower shortages became more of a problem. Slaves quickly took advantage of the situation, slowing down their pace of labor and not following orders, The South imposed a Cotton embargo and many Southerners believed they could persuade European intervention in the war by refusing to grow or give
New policies such as the Free Soil Appeal angered southerners because it limited the southern power in the federal government and sought to bar slavery in the new western territory. Slavery became very important in the south due to the expansion of farming lands plus an increase in the demand for cotton. This required the need for free labor or slave labor in order for the southerners to be able to afford such vast expansions. When considering all of the factors that caused the civil war Lincoln is only responsible for that cause in the event that he was elected President. There were many other causes that steered the country into a civil war including the fight between slave holding and non-slave states, the dispute between state versus federal rights, and economical and social differences between the two divisions none of which were Lincoln’s fault.
More people were coming from Europe to work in the Northern factories, unlike the South who still believed in slavery. People in the North wanted the South to free their slaves because they saw slavery as being unfair. With the election of Abraham Lincoln in 1860, Northerners felt supported by the president. President Abraham Lincoln was a Northerner, so he was a strong supporter of the North’s belief that slavery was wrong and should be abolished.. The idea that the President himself supported the North and their beliefs, raged the