cause of civil war

1. The Civil War
Causes

2. DIFFERENCES
Economic & Social

3. Similarities
• Both depend on
slavery/cotton
• “Small farmers” make up
majority in both regions
• Most people in the two
regions do not own slaves
• Both are racist
• North is changing:
progressing
• Industrialization/urbanization
• 4 million slaves in South
(40% of population)
• South supports States’
rights
• the right to declare National
Laws unconstitutional
• Lifestyles of people
• North = Urban
• South = Rural
Differences

4. ECONOMIC DIFFERENCES

5. North
• Developed an industrial
economy based on
manufacturing
• Favored high protective
tariffs
• to protect Northern
manufactures from foreign
competition
• Industrializing and
Urbanizing
• 90% of U.S. Manufacturing
occurs in North
• Northern economy diverse

6. The South
• Agricultural based economy
• Consisted of a slavery-based
plantation system in the lowlands of
the Atlantic and in the Deep South
• Subsistence farmers in foothills and
valleys of Appalachian Mountains
• Opposed tariffs, made the price of
manufactured good s more expensive
• 1790s old cash crops dying out
• By 1850 Southern Economy booming
WHY?
• Growth of “King Cotton”
• Cotton Gin
• Indian Removal = farm land
• British Textile industry
• Profitability of cotton led to increase
need for slaves

7. North South Advantage
Population 21.5 million 9 million
Factories 110,000 20,000
Miles of RR 22,000 9,000
Money $207 Million $47 Million
Cotton 4,000 bales 5,000,000 bales
Protective
Tariffs
Supported Against
States Rights Against Supported

8. Slavery’s Growth
• 1783 every state had
slaves
• By 1800 almost every
Northern state had
abolished slavery
• 1846 no slavery in the
North
• In the South Slave
population doubled
between 1810 and
1830
• Only ¼ of Southern
Families owned
slaves
• 88% less than 20
• 1% over 100
• Deep south where
most of slaves are

9. Slavery’s Growth
• Non-slave owning
Southerners
supported slavery
• Desire to own
slaves and racist
ideas
• By 1830s Southerners
deeming as a positive
institution
• Arguments were
based on historical
situations
• Said it was the same
as Northern labor in
factories
• Churches began to
show it as Christian
responsibility

10. KEY COMPROMISES
Hey…politicians put us closer to war

11. New States
• The admission of new states
continually led to conflicts over the
whether the new states would allow
slavery “slave states” or prohibit
slavery “free states”

12. Missouri Compromise
• The idea of Henry Clay
• Missouri = Slave State
• Maine = Free State
• Drew an east-west line
through the Louisiana
Purchase Territory
• 36 30’ N
• Above the line “free
states,” prohibited slavery
• Below the line “slave
states” allowed slavery
• Up until 1850 there were
an equal number of free
and slave states, thus
power in the Senate was
maintained

13. Compromise of 1850
California
• 1848 gold discovered
at Sutter’s Mill in
California
• Creates gold rush of
1849
• Rapid population
increase in California
• In 1850 California
wanted to come in as
a free state,
threatened to upset
the balance of power

14. Compromise of 1850
• Established 3 key provisions
• California entered the
Union as a free state
• The Fugitive Slave Act
required that all escaped
slaves be returned to their
owners
• Popular Sovereignty: or a
vote of the people living in
the territory would decide if
the area of the Mexican
Concession was to be free
or slave
• Northerners ignored the
Fugitive Slave Act
• The idea of Popular
Sovereignty was unclear

15. Kansas-Nebraska Act
• Gave the people of
Kansas and
Nebraska the right
to chose
• Popular
Sovereignty
• Repealed the
Missouri
Compromise
• This led to an event
called “Bloody
Kansas”

16. Bloody Kansas
• Pro- and anti- slavery
supporters rushed to Kansas
to vote
• Fighting between pro- and
anti- slavery supporters
erupted
• Fighting even made it to the
Senate floor
• Led to the birth of the
Republican Party
• Founded to oppose the
spread of slavery

17. MORE POLITICS

18. State’s Rights & Secession
• Southerners argued;
• That individual states could nullify laws passed by
congress  States Rights
• Remember the Example
• Nullification Crisis with South Carolina 1832
• A union that allowed state governments to invalidate
acts of the national legislature could be dissolved by
states seceding from the Union in defense of slavery
• Began to insist that states had entered the Union
freely and could leave it freely if they choose-
Secede

19. Dred Scott - 1857
• Decision by the Supreme Court
• Overturned efforts to limit the
spread of slavery
• Outraged Northerners
• Decision said
• Slaves were property
• Slaves were not citizens
• Slaves have not rights
• Congress could not regulate
slavery

20. Lincoln – Douglas Debates
• Lincoln joined the Republican
party
• Douglass was a Northern
Democrat
• Competed against each other for a
U.S. Senate seat in Illinois
• Conducted a series of debates
• Lincoln opposed the spread of
slavery
• Douglass favored popular
sovereignty
Lincoln warned:
• “A house divided against itself
cannot stand”

21. Ineffective Presidents
• During the 1850s the presidents provided little help
in keeping the nation together
• Due to this lack of leadership most of the
compromises will fail and the country will divide

22. Millard Fillmore 1850-53
• Compromise of 1850
passed
• Uncle Tom’s Cabin
Published

23. Franklin Peirce 1853-57
• Kansas Nebraska
Act passes
• Bleeding Kansas

24. James Buchanan 1857-61
• Dred Scott Decision
• John Browns Raid
• Failed to stop
South Carolina’s
Secession

25. Rise of the Republicans
• Due to the growing issue of slavery the Whig party
began to die
• In 1854 the Republicans will emerge as a sectional
party with Whig beliefs (pro business & strong
government), but opposed the growth of slavery
• The presidential election of 1856 showed the rapid
growth of the party and that they may be able to win
an election without getting a single vote in the South

26. ABOLITION

27. The Abolitionist Movement
• Grew in the North
• Led by William Lloyd
Garrison
• Published The Liberator,
an anti-slavery
newspaper
• New England religious
leaders began to preach
slavery as a violation of
Christian Principals

28. Uncle Tom’s Cabin
• Written by Harriet
Beecher Stowe, wife of
a New England
clergyman
• Best seller in the North
• Inflamed abolitionist
sentiment in the North
• Scared the south,
because of growing
strength of movement

29. The Underground Railroad
• Ran by abolitionist
• A system where slaves
would escape the south
and head North
• Journeys were generally
at night, on foot, and
from satiation to station
• Harriet Tubman:
famous “conductor”

30. Slave Revolts in VA
• Nat Turner’s Revolt
• Gabriel Prosser’s
Revolt
• Slave revolt in Virginia
• Feed white
Southerners fears
about rebellions
• Led to harsh fugitive
slave laws
• Southern abolitionist
were forced into
silence

31. John Brown’s Raid
• John Brown extreme
abolitionist, used
violence
• Oct, 16, 1859 raided
arsenal at Harpers Ferry
• Trying to get guns to
slaves
• Captured, tried and hung
• Turned into a martyr

32. The Final Split

33. The Election of 1860
• The Democrats divided into 2
factions
• Northern = Popular
sovereignty
• Southern = Total support of
slavery
• This gives the Republicans a
chance at victory
• Lincoln (Republican) won
• Wasn’t even on the ballot
in 11 of the 16 southern
states

34. The Election of Lincoln
• Southerners feared he
would abolish slavery
• Before he took office
South Carolina and 6
other Southern states
seceded (December
1860)
• They formed the
Confederate States of
America
• Elected Jefferson Davis
President

35. SLAVERY’S ROLE
And other causes

36. Slavery’s Role
• Slavery as a MORAL issue did not cause War
• Slavery as a symbol of differences between North and
South caused war…for most people, war was not about
slavery…but, about life itself

37. Slavery’s place
• Slavery is imbedded in southern system
• Politically: planters run government
• Economically: slavery intertwined with cotton and profit
• Socially: slavery defines basic values (independence,
freedom, land ownership, social status)

38. Other Causes
• Westward expansion
• States’ rights
• Extremists
• Collapse of the political system

39. BY 1861 WE ARE ON THE
DOORSTEP OF WAR