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Causes Of Slavery Divide The Nation

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How Slavery Divided the Nation There was a great deal of tension in the United States of America during mid-1800s between the North and South after the anti-slavery movement began. This divisional model is known as sectionalism which had both short-term and long-term effects. Some of the long-term causes of sectionalism were social stability, slavery in the west, and a general economic interest while short-term causes included the election of Abraham Lincoln and the westward expansion. Sectionalism was undoubtedly linked to slavery which shaped the American people’s perception of the division of the union at each step. Slavery in the west, economic interest, social stability, the election of western expansion and Abraham Lincoln are causes, …show more content…

One of the most important long-term causes of this was slavery in the new states joining the union. After the Mexican war had been settled with the signing of the treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo in 1848, the United States had acquired the land of modern-day Utah, Nevada, California, New Mexico, and other areas in the west (Lecture, 06/04/2018). With the newly acquired land, this created new conflicts between the north and south over whether or not the new states would permit slavery. The Confederates believed that fighting for slavery was justified because for them it was more than just about the economic benefits. Slavery worked like cement to hold the Confederates together. They believed that removing slavery would destroy social order as they knew it. Additionally, slavery created a white liberty effectively making white people equal in not being slaves (Manning, 32-33). The Confederates were afraid that if the new states became slave free states, it would lead to a new trend of slavery being removed from the slave states. This was one of the major events that led to …show more content…

During this time period, the southern states had a booming economy from the cotton industry. Southern cotton became a worldwide commodity and they quickly became the leading exporters of cotton around the world. The industry was also highly dependent on slavery because this provided them with free labor workforce. The north could not compete with them on a fair level for this reason. James Henry Hammond, a plantation owner from South Carolina, once famously stated that “Cotton is king” (06/01/2018). What Hammond meant by this was that the world had become so dependent on the southern cotton industry that there was no need to fear war with the northern states. This, however, was not really the case. The conflict against slavery was directly a conflict against the cotton industry due to the dependence on slaves in the cotton plantations. With conflicts from the north emerging against slavery, the interests in preserving the economy of the south led to the emergence of sectionalism, rather than reforming the southern economy. This system overall supported the perception that the southerners held about the division of the union and an effort to preserve their thriving

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