Civil War in Fort Sumter in American Essay

Fort Sumter is located in Charleston in South Carolina; the Fort was famous for its role that it played as a site where most shots that initiated the American Civil War were fired during the battle of Fort Sumter. This site was constructed using the slave labor from the year 1829 and unfinished in the year 1860, when the war started. This structure was designed to accommodate six hundred and fifty men and one hundred and thirty five guns arranged in three rows of gun emplacements, On April 12, 1861, there was a thirty four hour firing that was opened by the Confederate succession whereby a Gillmore Medal a special military decoration, was issued to the Union Service Members who performed their duties in Fort Sumter in the opening combat of the American Civil War. The battle in Fort Sumter was a conflict that ran for decades in America, the origin of this war was slavery in the new territories, which led to the negotiation of the year 1850 that was used to stop the political crisis, but it did not resolve the issue of slavery, slavery was considered by the Northerners as a national vice which was controlled by a number of Southern owners of large plantations who had the goal of spreading slavery. Under this, we find that the southerners were more worried about the growth of the North in terms of its population and industrial development. The development of both the North relied on free labor while the South relied on slave labor. There was a division of the United States in two regions that is, the North East and the Midway was recognized with its growing economy that relied on the farms owned by the families, the industries, and transportation, business with a high population in urban areas and in never encouraged its slavery outside the borders. While the Southern was controlled by a developed plantation system supported by slavery, the northern population was said to have grown quickly than the Southern population, this made it hard for the southern states to have control over the national government. Most of the slaves were not owned by many of the Southern whites who concentrated in subsistence farming, while the most of the salve owners were engaged in controlling the political and economical systems in the State. The northern states argued that the slavery was adverse for the nation, whereby in 1776 the north had to abolish slavery with a concern of maintaining unity in the states, within which politicians had a reasonable resistance to slavery, which led to negotiations such as the Missouri Compromise of 1820 and that of the year 1850. Under this the struggle to end slavery was not the main goal of the war, the war started with the need of expanding the territories of the slavery that was taken as a basic in economic, cultural and political differences that led to the rise of the control of the States’ rights and independence of the Southern States in the country. The attack of the Northern state at the Fort Sumter created Hostilities among the states whereby, the Northern States attempted to defend the nation, we find that Lincoln mentioned during his inaugural address in March 1861, that a National Unity to be put up, whereby there was already a withdrawal by the Seven States. This unity was to be used as a war goal to unite the democrats, Border States and the Republicans. In 1863, Lincoln included liberation that permanently removed the division factor that lead to independence of the other states, even though he proposed federal laws against slavery in the year 1858 where withdrawal was increased, the Slave-owning South and the Anti-slavery North, which made him express a concern to stop the expansion of slavery putting in mind the publics believe that the slave trade was in its way of extinction. In the 1850s, there was a strong political battle that focused on the expansion of slave trade in the territories which accelerated the Southern movement towards secession , under this we see that both the Southern and the Northern states were threatened by secession, whereby the Southern States had fears of losing its control of the central government to the forces that were against slavery-while the Northern States were fearing that the Southern had already taken control over the government, this led to this civic war. The Southern was supported by the election of the Republican Abraham Lincoln through which most regional leaders feared that he was put in a position which would enable him stop the expansion of the salve trade, we see that many Southern citizens thought that slavery would be abolished by either Lincoln or another person from the north and therefore they decided to split. Fear of racial and equality was also seen as a leading factor to this civic war whereby the Southerners expressed their fears for the loss of slavery that would thereafter lead to the economic losses. Also the fears of racial equality whereby, there was the probability of a doctrine of equality to be set through which all men regardless of race would be made the slaves of a particular region and this would make them demoralized and degraded in a way that they could fight against the slavery. The fear of modernization was seen as a leading factor to the civil war, where we see that the Northern States were becoming economically stable, with its strong knowledge of having aggressive, free labor capitalism, while the South remained in its traditional standards of living. The Northern was said to be having an industrialized economy whereby, it engaged itself in producing of arms, munitions supplies including monetary contributions and transportation while the confederate territory continued to shrink and its economy weakened. This led to the North having power over the shipments, steamships, river boats and the navy that made the North to come up with the construction of ships that led to the north to also take control over the river systems thus blocking the whole Southern coastline making its transportation slower and difficult to manage. Various international communities intervened in this civil war this included the Britain and France who, rather increased the Southern States chances of winning the secession from the United States. Under this we see that the Southerners decided to involve themselves in cotton consignment, in which they had an objective of making the economy of Europe to be inefficient thinking that it would have made Britain enter the war in order to get cotton, but this ideology did not work since Europe had to prove to have a productive supply of cotton to the British thus the Northern States gained exports at a more British import trade. The Southern failure in the cotton production came as a result of the control put on the transportation systems by the Northern states, which therefore hindered any transaction between any other countries with southern states. In the early 1820s and 1830s, the religious leaders were seen to come up with an idea of abolition as one of the methods they thought would help them resolve this war; these leaders were termed as abolitionists who attempted various social reforms extinguish the war, among them were Wendell Phillips and Frederick Douglas who insisted for the immediate abolition of slavery. Among the two, there were also other abolitionists like Theodore Weld and Arthur Tappan, who asked for an abrupt action against the war, though the action, was to be a gradual liberation program with a long system. This course was also supported by the Anti-slavery men, who were not abolitionists they tried hard to limit the slavery; they were seen to be ambitious to end the slave trade in their states this is best explained in the 1841 case, where we find that John Quincy Adams presented the Amisted African slaves in the United States supreme court, claiming that they should be set free. These abolitionists believed that all people were equal before God where, they came up with an argument that enslaving another person is a violation of the Higher law. The slave owners were angered by this movement and they defended this fact, saying that slavery was good and that it was authorized by God. We see that the southern came up with Biblical interpretations that directly disagreed with those of the abolitionists, under which they interpreted the case of the curse of Noah’s son Ham and his offspring in Africa, can be used as a validation for the slavery of blacks. In 1830s it was found that the General Post Master of the United States banned the mailing of pamphlets that were made to fight against slavery to the South. In this case we find that the Southern States refused to be termed as abolitionists. And anyone who was found rebelling against the slavery was charged with his actions, this is better explained in the 1859 case of, John Brown who attempted to start a slave rebellion which threatened the Northern States, Brown’s efforts were to fight against the slavery; whereby he seized the federal Harpers Ferry Armory at the Harper’s Ferry, Virginia in the year 1859, the ferry had carried many weapons to be used in the war, he was strongly supported by many Anti-slavery members of the Secret Six that provided the financial support for his raid. Among the supporters was, George Luther Stearns, Franklin. Sanborn, among others. As an effect of the raid Brown was captured by the army that was dispatched to put down Browns’ raid and he was tried for treason against Virginia and he was later hanged. At the end of the war we see that the South emerged as the winner of the war whereby it is said that the Union took advantage of the confederation in terms of industrial strength, population, and the objectivity of winning the war. Most people argue that the confederate action were only used to delay the defeat, but the confederacy was seen to have won the war by the survival of Lincoln where he defeated McClellan in the 1864 elections under which the aspiration of the southern victory was ended. With the success in the elections Lincoln was seen as a success in getting the support of the neighboring States, the conflict democrats, liberated slaves and Britain and France. We also see that Lincoln defeated the copper heads and their peace policy. He had found military leaders such as Grant and Sherman who took the advantage in battle over the Associate Militia through which the war was won by the generals who feared no bloodshed and by the end of 1864 the South had lost the anticipation to win the battle. Though, the Northern war leaders noticed that the victory over this war needed more than fighting. It decided to come up with ways of encompassing the two goals of the war, where by we see that the secession was to be renounced and all forms of slaves were to be eliminated. These leaders differed completely on the following: the criteria of the war and also on the degree at which the national control that were to be given to the South, and the process by which the southern was to be reincorporated into the union again. The war ended in the year 1877, which carried a complex and various series of federal and state policies. The civil war amendments were long-term results divided into three where the thirteenth amendments was that which abolished the slavery, the fourteenth one was that which extended federal permissible protections to the people not putting in mind the race, and the fifteenth one which abolished racial boundaries on voting. References Donald, D. E. (2001): The Civil War and Reconstruction:-latest edition 2001. 700 page survey Davis. W. C. (1983): The Imperiled Union 1861-1865 3v (1983) Fellman, M. E. (2003): This Terrible War- The Civil War and its Aftermath. 2003, 400 page survey Reach, J. P. (2005): Americans at War Society, Culture and the Homefront. Vol. 2: 1816-1900 Tulloch, H. (1999): The Debate on the American Civil War Era† 1999, historiography