Discuss The Causes Of The Civil War Dbq

Uncompromising differences between the South (Confederacy) and the North (Union) created a civil war that lasted five years. During this war, Abraham Lincoln was president. His election led to the secession of many Southern states. After refusing to recognize the Confederacy as its own nation, the American Civil War commenced in 1861. The three main causes of the Civil War between the North and the South were industrial and agricultural economies, politics, and slavery. The first main cause of the Civil War was economic differences between the Northern and Southern states. During the first few decades of the 19th century, the North had an industrial revolution that brought an economy that relied on laborers. While at the same time, the South continued to rely on slaves for their farming and the production of cotton. The Northerners did not need slaves for their economy, but the Southerners could not make any profit without cotton or slaves. In the 1860’s, the North had twice as many railroads as the South, and the South had a bigger cotton production because of their slave population (Document A). This demonstrates how the Union maintained an industrial economy and the Confederacy

The Southern states utilized slaves to work their large plantations and to perform other work. Oftentimes, slaves were traded, rented, or sold to pay off debts, thus being treated like objects or property by the slaveowners (Document G). This demonstrates how the slaves dealt with injustice and discrimination while under the white man 's control. Although the Union disagreed with the Confederacy’s use of slavery, 12% of slaves lived in the border states of the North and the South (Document B). While the North had no slaves, the South owned 3,500,000. Slavery was perhaps the greatest cause of the Civil War because the Union and Confederacy did not come to an agreement, leading to more conflict between the