What Caused The Civil War

Slavery itself was not the reason that the civil war was started, yet is a factor in how it was caused. The idea of slavery fueled political and social relations between the North and South during the 1850s. Acts, such as the Fugitive Slave Act, hampered the sentiment towards the South, while the antislavery and abolition movement coalesced Southern opinion against the North. However, the feud between the North and South in attempts to gain power over the other, and the South's eventual loss, is what primarily caused the Civil War.

The political struggles between the North and South can be seen through the many laws and acts they placed. The Kansas-Nebraska Act was the act that called popular sovereignty into play for the South, who aimed to gain these two states on the side of pro-slavery. The South's purpose in this was to gain
The Civil War's original aims was to give the South greater states' rights, as well as an equal say in the political happenings of the nations. The inability for the South to change the vote for the presidency, as well as the weakening of their state powers, led to this secession. The South wanted to be "equal" to the Northern states to prevent legislation being passed that weakened one and benefited the other. The North's aim in the Civil war was the reunite the nation, not to remove the institution of slavery. Lincoln's goal in going to war was to preserve the union, not free the slaves. However, in order to convince states from leaving the union, Lincoln announced the Emancipation Proclamation, which punished dissenting states by outlawing slavery for leaving the union, but allows states that stayed within the union to continue slavery. Slavery was ignited as the main reason for the Civil War once it was wholly threatened, whereas it was previously only threatened by public opinion in the