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.
The Southern anti-slavery movement made successful efforts in freeing slaves through escape “than in promoting emancipation” (Hine et al. 2011). Nat Turner’s revolt and David Walker’s Appeal, encouraged freedom by way of violence and successfully gained attention from Northern abolitionist and Southern slaveholders. Slaveholders in the South believed freeing blacks would disrupt their society by encouraging “resistance and revolt” (Hine et al. 2011) amongst Blacks, who were meant to be enslaved.
General John Freemont of Missouri attempted to enact an order which would have freed all slaves. General David Hunter, aware of the potential slaves have to turn the tide to the war, also attempted to enact an order which would have abolished slavery in South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida. Lincoln stops all of these orders from being enacted due to stance of slavery. Lincoln felt that compensated emancipation or colonization for free Blacks in American was the best policy but Union victories increasing in number, Lincoln would enact the Emancipation Proclamation to officially shift the moral authority away from American unity to freedom. The Emancipation Proclamation, initially enacted as a war strategy had been held off for so long because Lincoln believed that making the war about freeing slaves would force slave holding states into seceding from the union but with the end of war in sight, the proclamation is officially
In his views, Lincoln saw slavery as an unavoidable social evil that was essential to the economy . To the blacks, it was immoral and inhuman, but the Border States relied on the slave trade for their economic production. Abolishing slavery only meant altering the economic system in the slave Border States and this could only result in less support. Lincoln believed that slavery was destined to fade away with time but could not just be terminated abruptly. He advocated for a gradual termination of slavery but not a direct confrontation; first was the introduction of the Emancipation Proclamation, then the compensation of slave and finally colonization of the freed slave.
Because in my perspective, this contradictory proclamation seems to be a political propaganda to support only the whites. Today I stand, as a runaway slave who escaped the grasp of slave owners and harsh Fugitive Slave Laws presented in the Compromise of 1850. However, tension has finally reached a peak between the North and the South due to the secession in 1860. I believe that several key events from 1845-1861 caused all this turmoil and crashed the regional differences between the Union and the Confederacy together. Eventually leading to the outbreak of the Civil war in 1861.
The northern states where anti slavery and the southern states were pro slavery. Because the south’s economic structure needed slaves for plantations and the north was more industrialized. slavery was frowned upon in the north .and in the south slavery was veiwed as a way of life .. As America expanded over time the two sides fought for power. Each side had their own beliefs about t slavery but no one could come to a compromise. Before the civil war abolitionists and activist in politics such as William Steward tries to expand the abolishing of slavery by saying s “the country is a theater that
Research Question: How did the abolitionist movement impact the slave trade? Thesis Statement: The Abolitionist movement impacted trade by forming and supporting the Underground Railroad, Causing the Civil War, and gradually ending discrimination. The American Anti-Slavery Society was established in 1833, but abolitionist sentiment antedated the republic. For example, the charter of Georgia prohibited slavery, and many of its settlers fought a losing battle against allowing it in the colony, Before independence, Quakers, most black Christians, and other religious groups argued that slavery was incompatible with Christ's teaching. Moreover, a number of revolutionaries saw the glaring contradiction between demanding freedom for themselves while holding slaves.
With the proposal of the Wilmot Proviso, the precarious balance of free-to-slave states was again being threatened with disruption. The proposal failed, but not before succeeding in creating enough of a stir to contribute to the necessitating of the Compromise of 1850. In this new compromise, which is considered a contributing factor to the delaying of the start of civil war, several new slave policies were enacted. Included in these were the controversial Fugitive Slave Act and the slave trade being abolished in the District of Columbia. While temporarily pacifying a significant number of both Northern and Southerners, the 1850 Compromise also served to widen the ideological gap between
1863 marked the end of slavery and with the emancipation of slaves came hopes for a happier and more prosperous future. Instead emancipated slaves were met with as much opposition as they’d endured in bondage. States rushed to enact laws that would continue to oppress African Americans, and racist vigilante groups were contrived as a means of combating any and all signs of progress in the Black community (Leary, 2005, p.
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.