Civil War Dbq

The Civil War, a time when brothers, cousins, and neighbors fought each other for four years. Where when each battle ended, the earth was dyed red with the blood of those fighting for their beliefs. And all for one thing; freedom. The United States was tearing itself apart. The South wanted to hold onto the economy they had built. They wanted to hold onto what they saw as their authority to make decisions regarding trade as individual states. A right they felt was theirs as they were no longer under English rule, and were willing to seceed over. While the North wanted to keep the Democracy that they had fought so fiercely for from England. But the greatest issue between the North and South was about the human rights of the African American

After all, the new Americans had already fought for that freedom by gaining their freedom from England. If the North could not accept their way of life, then the South would just seceed. But many believed that separating the nation would destroy the Democracy they had fought for. Abraham Lincoln stated, “A house divided against itself cannot stand. I believe this Government cannot endure, permanently half slave and half free.” (House Divided Speech) The South felt that the North was betraying them like England had betrayed them. But to separate the North and South would put them both in a position of weakness. In Across Five Aprils by Irene Hunt, the arguement around the kitchen table was one being had across the states. “But this separation, Wilse, it won't do. We're a union; separate, we're jest two weakened, puny pieces, each needin' the other."(Across Five Aprils by Irene Hunt). If the South succeeded in secession, there would be goods, services and trading that would have to be rebuilt from the ground up. Losing all the union had built since the time of England’s

Slavery was the single greatest pivot point of the Civil War. In the Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave, written by Himself, Mr. Douglass was born into slavery, but unlike other slaves, taught himself to read and think. He recognized the abuses that slavery brought with beatings, starvation and using someone, and that it also stole a person’s freedom to think and be. “No man can be truly free whose liberty is dependent upon the thought, feeling and action of others, and who has himself no means in his own hands for guarding, protecting, defending and maintaining that liberty” (Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave, written by Himself). Douglass also understood that as long as men (and women and children) were used by other people for their own greed and gain, both people would be unhappy. If a slave owner, a man, said to his slave, that everything about him was his, then would the owner be willing to own all of the fight, rebellious nature, and the desire for freedom that went on inside the slave? “No man can put a chain about the ankle of his fellow man without at last finding the other end fastened about his own neck.” (Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave, written by Himself). The value of human equality was recognized by Northerners and Abraham Lincoln when he stated in the Gettysberg Address, “Our