Reliving History

Reliving History next month is all about re-enactments, living history and the people within the hobby. It is also about photography of the people and events that forms the public community for the group. Enjoy the site, the photographs and the stories.

Causes of the Civil War

Submitted by david d on Fri, 11/28/2008 - 17:09
An historical event is rarely born fully formed nor is there a complete lack of understanding for why the development occurred. Change and inertia can take place in a few days, a few years or event decades and centuries. Early characters in the developing drama may not have a clear idea of the surges of time. Later characters begin to feel the anxiety as they jockey for favorable positions. The need to win and succeed becomes a strong incentive.

A so it is with the causes of the American Civil War. It was not just slavery or the Republican win of 1860 that caused the Civil War. We can point out State’s Rights or economics and would be only partly correct. How many would think of the invention of the cotton gin or the publication of “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” as being significant factors leading to the splitting of a nation. Great happenings as the Mexican War and California Gold Rush separated the nation and pushed us closer to succession.

I have chosen thirty events which led to the Civil War in America. Each builds upon those that came before it. Certainly there may be many more. Think about adding them as this book as it progresses.
1619: Arrival of Africans

1776: Declaration of Independence

1781: U.S. Constitution

Compromise of 1820

Sectionalism

Election of 1828

John C. Calhoun

Nullification

Tariff of Abomination

Manifest Destiny

Mexican War

California Gold Rush

Popular Sovereignty

Compromise of 1850

Fugitive Slave Law

 Webster-Haynes Debate

Wilmot Proviso

Cotton Gin

Seventh of March Speech

Kansas Nebraska Act

Bleeding Kansas

John Brown

Uncle Tom's Cabin

Underground Railroad

Dred Scott

Abolitionists

Lincoln-Douglas Debate

Steven A. Douglas

Election of 1860

Convention of Secession
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