Civil War the Beginning of the Nineteenth

Civil War

The beginning of the nineteenth century marked a period of reform and social changes in Europe and the young American state that was triggered and partly encouraged by the new era of industrialization. The transfer from agrarian to industrial societies changed people's lives and offered new perspectives for those concerned for the well being of the society as a whole. The widening gap between the American North and South continued to grow after the euphoria of the first decades since the Declaration of Independence had been proclaimed in Philadelphia in 1787.

The majority of the Americans were still living in an agrarian society, but the numbers were disproportionate between North and South and many historians and political analysts consider these differences in stages of development as the roots of social inequity and finally, of the war between North and South.

While the American North was embracing new technologies, new ideas, reforms, especially social reforms and was aiming towards justice and equality as the fathers of the nation had stipulated in the Constitution of the United States, the South was unwilling to keep the pace and give up to reforms. The small farmers in the North were still able to produce enough in order to counterbalance the revenues from the industrial sector, but things began to change, industrialism beginning to ask for more and more working forces and agriculture gaining more technical means which meant that more farmers were able to free themselves from the land and go seek other earning opportunities in the cities.

The rich plantation owners form the South were content with the situation things were in before by the end of the eighteenth century and they had no intention of giving up their life style and wealth sources that came mainly from the tobacco and cotton cultures. Slavery which helped colonists get rich in the new world and finally conquer a whole new continent already became obsolete in the North. The progressive views of the Northerners and the fact that slavery became identified with shameless customs of the past affected the relationships between North and South at all possible levels.

2) Political interests were also affected by the territorial expansion. The South was eager to make Texas a new state of the Commonwealth and even more anxious to make it a slave state. The North opposed the spread of slavery since the Northern abolitionists hoped to see slavery eradicated throughout the entire American nation and thus opposed the Annexation of Texas. The prod and inflexible plantation and slave owners received a hard blow with this opposition. The patriarchal southern society that was strictly separated in social classes kept traditional roles as a rule of thumb. The North received waves of European immigrants and its need for expansion were strictly the result of the need to conquer new territories in order to develop allow society to develop economically. The same applied of course to the Southern expansion needs, but the southerners needed states like Texas to instate slavery as the means to insure production in the fields.

Under the presidency of James Pollock and as a result of America's defeat over Mexico, the United States acquired Texas and California. The North had no intention to leave it for being planted with cotton and tobacco and populated with slaves. Women and African-American people were beginning to ask for equal rights.

The balance between the representatives in Congress for the slave and slave free states was relatively equal, but the acquiring or admission of new states started to become of concern for those who worried that the other party will gain majority. The admission of new state of Missouri offered the opportunity for the political representatives on both sides to try and reach a settlement. While the Northern politicians were fighting against the injustice of the practice of slavery, the Southerners were claiming that the South will be condemned to starve if Slavery were to be abolished. Maine, another new state, brought the two oppositional parties the chance to settle for compromise: they accepted Missouri as a slave state, while declaring Maine as a free state in 1820. The settlement also "stipulated that all the Louisiana Purchase territory north of the southern boundary of Missouri, except Missouri, would be free, and the territory below that line would be slave" (http://civilwar.bluegrass.net/secessioncrisis/200303.html)

The new working classes were beginning to ask for reforms and new rights, radically changing the relationship between employer and employee through the formation of labor unions.

The United Stated developed new improved relationships with the other nations and at the same time new means of keeping internal affairs away form the involvement of foreign powers. The Monroe Doctrine, in 1823, drawn under the presidency of James Monroe and his secretary of State, John Quincy Adams finally established the balance of power between the old Europe and the New World.

Economics which were closely related with politics led to the first crisis during the presidency of Andrew Jackson, elected for the first time in 1828. High tariffs on foreign goods, continued to discontent the South that needed everything they were not able to produce themselves, which was overwhelming, at the low prices. South Carolina declared the Tariff Act of 1828 null. The first major crisis that could have led to the outbreak of war between North and South was barely avoided through a second compromise in 1833.

Depression, caused partially by the Jacksonian attempt to weaken and eventually destroy the National Bank, caused the increase in polarization in the political forces. The Whig Party, formed by those who opposed Jackson was formed. Depression continued after Jackson, claming the innocent democratic representative that followed him: Van Buren.

President John Tyler, initially a Whig Party representative, finally took some measures that came against the beliefs of the party that supported him: The Webster-Ashburton Treaty of 1842 established a permanent eastern border with Canada and cooled tensions with Britain. During his final days as president, Tyler also pushed through congressional measures to annex Texas (http://www.sparknotes.com/history/american/precivilwar/summary.html).

By 1950, the Abolitionist movement reached its peak in the North, with numerous supporters adhering to the reform movements. Agriculture gained new improved technical means which enabled the Southern planters to acquire more slaves and gave the opportunity to the western wheat farmers to sell their surplus to the North.