Essay On The Causes Of The Civil War

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The burning issue that led to the disturbance in the United States was the debate over the future of slavery. This dispute led to secession which then led to a war where Americans fought Americans. Though this argument is proven to be accurate, the causes of the Civil War can be seen embedded deeper into American History, dating back to the 1600s. Though social and political issues after 1820 paved the road to the Civil War, the issues presented during that time was created over two hundred years before.
Slaves made up a large portion of the region’s personal and corporate wealth. In the Journal of Political Economy, Alfred Conrad and John Meyer wrote about the economics of slavery in the Antebellum South. In a summary data on slave prices, "...both the median and the mean price for prime field hands were in the range of from $900 to $950 in the period 1830-50" (Conrad, p. 100). Slaves could be rented, traded or sold, mostly to pay debts, but also to earn social …show more content…
When historian James McPherson was asked what the main cause of the war was, he replied, "...the issue of slavery and its expansion...built up over decades and accelerated...came to a head in the presidential election of 1860, causing the deep South states to secede..." (McPherson, 2015). Undoubtedly, those series of actions pushed both sides of the country further away from each other. However, the conflict started years before at the very beginnings of American history.
Differences between the North and South led to conflict between them; however, the creation of these differences started in the 1600s with differences between the three colonial regions: New England. Mid-Atlantic/Middle, and the Southern colonies. Specialized economies emerged as a result of available natural resources provided which dictated the unique specialty each region would go

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