Apush African American affects on the civil war

From 1861 through the 1870’s African Americans were the main cause of the Civil War. Being inaugurated as the 16th president, Abraham Lincoln wanted the North and the South to come together but their differences collided. The North was proslavery and the South approved of slavery. In the South, African American slaves are being viewed as property, not given equal rights and are working in terrible conditions. The North gave freedom to African American slaves but the ignorance of the South for impeding African American equal rights caused many arguments. Before the Civil War the South seceded from the North and later became The Confederate States of America and the North became the United States of America. African Americans shaped the course and consequences of the Civil War through resistance, escaping and joining the Unions army to battle against the Confederate. Towards the beginning of the civil war General Benjamin Butler reported to John Cameron one of the secretary of war that there was large numbers of slaves trying to desperately escape the Confederates to seek help from the Union. The enslaved African Americans were working in heinous conditions and were being forced to work and build forts along rivers. General Butler, Lincoln and the people that were part of the Union did not know what to do with the African American escapees because they were faced with the fugitive slave act. The fugitive slave act stated that any runaways captured should be returned to their owners which meant that any enslaved African Americans that tried to escape to Free States must be returned to their owners or they would be legally punished. President Lincoln contemplated whether to follow the law or take the slaves and be held responsible for them. General Butlers called the African American slaves escapees “contra band of war” and planned to use them as help to serve the Union army by digging trenches. Having the “contra band of war” or African American