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You're reading What were the major causes of the US Civil War?
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Comments
I believe it is true: President Lincoln's aim to preserve the Union at any cost caused the war. He ordered armed invasion.
by Thom64 on August 11th, 2004
This answer is so poor, and so patently simplistic that I almost consider this post spam.
by jnourse on November 8th, 2004
The South started the war by attacking Fort Sumter. That is a fact.
by jwmbiz on January 22nd, 2005
Way too overly simplified.
by pareto on December 12th, 2005
Ah...what a dismal view of history we have been taught. First, Lincoln attempted to make a deal with the South protecting slavery forever if the South would not secede. Had the South only been interested in protecting slavery all they would have had to do would have been to accept Lincoln's deal and slavery would have been preserved forever.
Even Secession was not the reason behind the war, Secession had been taught as a Constitutional Right since the time of the Ratification, indeed in several of the Ordinances of Ratification it was clearly stated that if the parties of the Constitution abused that compact that the States would revert back to their former state outside of the Union. Secession was taught in all the Military Institutes around the country, including West Point until after the War when all references of the Right were erased.
Indeed, even Lincoln himself stated that the People have the Right to change, leave or discard their government.
by Republicae on May 31st, 2008
"This country, with its institutions, belongs to the people who inhabit it. Whenever they shall grow weary of the existing Government, they can exercise their constitutional right of amending it or their revolutionary right to dismember or overthrow it."--Lincoln.
So, what happened to change Lincoln's mind? It is obvious if you read the newspapers of the day; it was the fact that the Northern Industrialist pressured Lincoln when they realized that if the South Seceded from the Union there would no longer be a goose that laid the golden tariff egg that supplied both the government and therefore the Northern constituents of all the benefits of that tariff income. In fact, Lincoln himself said "What will become of our tariffs".
As far as Fort Sumter, well, Lincoln made it almost impossible for the South to ignore what was happening at Fort Sumter. Lincoln was determined to make the South strike first and start a war.
by Republicae on May 31st, 2008
Lincoln planned to use the federal Forts in the South to blockade the South, starve it into submission and back into the Union. The South had no real choices but to defend itself against such a threat. The South had declared itself to be a free-trade zone to the world, the North could not allow such a thing to take place and thus we have Mr. Lincoln's War.
by Republicae on May 31st, 2008