Mr. Thomas
U.S History per. 9
4 December 2014
Civil War Causes
Most people know of the heroes of the civil war. But what about its instigators? Those that in their fight for change unwittingly served as catalysts for what may have been an unavoidable battle for freedom. Many people have debated over the years of what really caused the Civil War. Some say Bloody Kansas, and others say the election of Abraham Lincoln. The more appropriate question is not what but who started the Civil War. The civil war was the effect of many different causes, but the main instigators were Harriet Beecher Stowe, Dred Scott, and John Brown. All three of these abolitionist pioneers stirred the already boiling pot of slavery by initiating conflict.
One of the first sparks in the flame of Civil War was a small unassuming woman named Harriet Beecher Stowe. She was disgusted by the Fugitive Slave Law and wanted to open the eyes of northerners to the horrors of slavery. The book was about a lovable slave name uncle Tom who was savagely beaten to death by his owner. With sentences such as “Scenes of blood and cruelty are shocking to our ear and heart. What man has nerve to do, man has not nerve to hear,” Harriet Beecher Stowe forced northerners to slavery's right in its face so that they could ignore it no longer. Within the first year of its publishing several hundred thousand copies were sold. This enraged Northerners and many of them vowed that they would never have anything to do with the fugitive slave law. According to the North American Pageant history book slaveholding Southerners condemned her as a "vile wretch in petticoats," and called her book unfair. These varying opinions helped to further divide the north and south which is why "The little woman who wrote the book that made this great war "is among those that helped to start and are arguably to win the Civil War.
One man helped start the Civil War by trying to take justice into his own. This man was John Brown. John Brown was a daunting abolitionist that move to Kansas with part of his family. Enraged over the proslavery raids in Lawrence, he and several followers in May 1856 attacked five proslavery men and in a gruesome display chopped them to bits. This infuriated the Southerners who believed that abolitionists must encourage this behavior and thus in that same year a small-scale Civil War began in Kansas. John Brown's version of vigilante justice did not end there. In 1859 he led an unsuccessful attack on Harpers Ferry hoping to help the slaves to acquire weapons and rise against their oppressors. This attack led to his capture, and subsequent hanging. John Brown was seen in the north as a martyr and in the south as a murderer. It is clear to see how that could have increased tensions between the north and south and led to Civil War.
.jpg)
Yet another of these Civil War pioneers was Dred Scott. Dred Scott had one simple ambition: to fight for his own personal freedom. His case had far larger repercussions, however. Dred Scott was a black slave and it live with his master in Illinois and Wisconsin territory these territories were dubbed free lands and thus he believed that his five-year stay there warranted his freedom. The court ruled that dread Scott was a black slave and because of this was not truly a citizen so could not sue in federal court. They also tried to solve the issue of slavery once and for all by stating that slaves were merely property, the Missouri compromise had been unconstitutional, and that the Constitution protected slave owners rights at all times. This infuriated anti- slavery Northerners who argued that this was just an opinion and not a rule, which in turn crossed the proslavery southerners leading to even more conflict and tension.
It has been clear from the very beginning what should started the Civil War: slavery. But a more interesting question would be who caused the Civil War. Anti-slavery abolitionists such as John Brown, Dred Scott, and Harriet Beecher Stowe unwittingly began the Civil War. These men and women serve to show a large message that one individual can spark an entire movement.
