V The American Civil War

Brief Introduction

The American Civil War（1861—1865）, also known as the War Between the States, was a civil war in the United States of America. Eleven Southern slave states declared their secession（脱离）from the U.S. and formed the Confederate States of America（the Confederacy，美国南部邦联）. Led by Jefferson Davis, they fought against the U.S. federal government（the Union）, which was supported by all the free states and the five border states（Delaware, Kentucky, Maryland, Missouri, and West Virginia）in the north. The Union won a decisive victory. The American Civil War was the deadliest war in American history, producing more than 970,000 casualties（人员伤亡）,3% of the population, including 620,000 soldier deaths. The war ended slavery in the United States, restored the Union, and strengthened the role of the federal government. The social, political, economic and racial issues of the war brought changes that helped make the country a united superpower.

Causes of the Civil War

●Economic factors

In the days of the American Revolution and of the adoption of the Constitution, differences between the North and the South were small under their common interest in establishing a new nation. But in the 19th century the south and north developed in different directions. Before the Civil War began in 1861, the South remained almost completely agricultural and was dominated by a settled plantation system based on slavery. There was very little urbanization or industrialization. Slave owners controlled politics and economics.

On the other hand, The North was by then firmly established as an industrial society and had a rapidly growing economy based on family farms, industry, mining, commerce and transportation, with a large and rapidly growing urban areas and population and no slavery outside the Border States.

The South manufactured little. Almost all manufactured goods had to be imported. Southerners therefore opposed high tariffs. The manufacturing economy of the North, on the other hand, demanded high tariffs to protect its own products from cheap foreign competition.

●Political factors

Different economic needs sharpened sectional differences, adding to the interregional hostility. As Northern and Southern patterns of living differed, their political ideas also developed marked differences. The North needed a central government to build an infrastructure of roads and railways, protect its complex trading and financial interests, and control the national currency. The South depended much less on the federal government than did other regions, and Southerners therefore felt no need to strengthen it. In addition, Southern patriots feared that a strong central government might interfere with slavery.

●The issue of slavery

The chief and immediate cause of the war was slavery. After the Mexican War, the dominant political issue was the spread of slavery into the western territories. The South wanted to expand slavery into the new territories. But the North opposed to this because slavery was regarded as violation of human rights as a free person. The government balanced the disagreement with the passage of Compromise of 1850 and the Kansas-Nebraska Act in 1854. The Compromise of 1850 provided a temporary respite（缓解）from sectional strife, but the passage of Kansas-Nebraska Act had an extremely divisive effect on the nation and spurred the creation of the Republican Party, formed largely to keep slavery out of the western territories. Soon the Republican Party emerged as the dominant force throughout the North.

●Secession

The election of Lincoln as a Republican President in 1860 resulted in the secession of seven southern states in February 1861. As an outspoken opponent of the expansion of slavery in the United States, Abraham Lincoln had long regarded slavery as an evil; therefore, the election of Lincoln as president was viewed by the South as a threat to slavery which was such an important part of Southern society and without which the South felt that they could not survive. During the campaign many Southerners had threatened that their states would secede from the Union if Lincoln was elected.

South Carolina led the way in secession in December, 1860. This was even before Lincoln took office in March 1861. Within six weeks South Carolina was followed by six other cotton-growing states: Mississippi, Florida, Georgia, Alabama, Louisiana, and Texas. The seven seceding states met in Montgomery, Alabama and formed the Confederate States of America in February 9,1861. They chose Jefferson Davis as president and picked Richmond, Virginia, as their capital. The constitution of the Confederate States was similar to that of the United States, except the power of the central government was much more limited. Slavery was explicitly protected.

●Lincoln's Position

Lincoln took the oath of office on March4,1861. In his inaugural address Lincoln eloquently called for the preservation of the Union. To the south he was both conciliatory and firm. He promised that he would not interfere with slavery where it already existed. But he also said that the Union was perpetual and that secession was illegal. Lincoln hoped that the seceded states would return to the Union with time, and without force.

●Fort Sumter

After Lincoln's inauguration, attention was drawn to the federal forts in the South, especially Fort Sumter in Charleston harbor. Fort Sumter was lightly garrisoned（守卫）and had provisions for only six weeks. As supplies dwindled, Lincoln informed the Confederate authorities that he was sending a ship with supplies to the fort. He promised he would not send troops without notice.

The Confederates had thousands of troops encamped around Charleston and cannons placed so that they could bomb Fort Sumter. When Lincoln's message arrived, Jefferson Davis ordered Confederate General Pierre G. T. Beauregard to demand the fort's surrender. When the commander of the fort, refused, Confederate shore cannons began firing at the fort on April 12. The American Civil War had begun. In the spring of 1861, each side expected a brief war and an early victory. Few people foresaw that four years of bloody struggle lay ahead. The Union would survive, and slavery issue would be settled, but at great cost.

Civil War

The attack on Fort Sumter outraged people in the North. President Lincoln issues a Proclamation calling for 75,000 militiamen, and summoning a special session of Congress for July 4. On April 19, 1861, he ordered a blockade against Southern ports

The South, regarding this as declaration of war, also called for volunteers to fight. At this point, four more slave states—Virginia, Arkansas, Tennessee, and North Carolina— seceded from the Union,thus forming an eleven state Confederacy with a population of 9 million, including nearly 4 million slaves. The Union will soon have 21 states and a population of over 20 million.

●North versus South

The war aims of both sides were simple. The goal of the South was to defend independence. The goal of the North was to restore the Union by force. Although neither side was prepared for war, each was confident of its military superiority.

The confidence of the North lied in the knowledge of its advantages in human and material resources. The North, with its larger population, better transportation system, and more productive economy, had advantages that outweighed the South's superior military leadership during the war.

The South had a stronger military tradition, and many of the nation's outstanding military leaders were southerners. In addition, the South had the popular support of the southern people in their quest for independence. More importantly, they had the advantage of being able to fight a defensive war on familiar home ground, and, therefore, their lines of communication and supply would be shorter. Anther advantage of the South was that it had the sympathy of many Europeans.

●The War

The South's strategy was to fight a defensive war, whereas the North, on the other hand, had to invade Confederate territory and subdue the South completely.

At the outset of the Civil War, neither side possessed the material nor manpower required for what would prove to be the first modern industrialized war. The North at least had a navy and the Union's naval superiority was a significant factor contributing to the defeat of confederate forces. In the early stage of the war, the Union forces were successful in the west, but the Confederate forces held out against Union attacks in the East. Confederate General Robert E. Lee's first invasion of the North was repulsed（击退）at the strategic battle of Antietam in September 1862.

The Union victory at Anteitam gave Lincoln an opportunity to make the announcement of freeing the slaves. He issued the Emancipation Proclamation on January 1,1863.The proclamation declared that“all persons held as slaves”within the rebellious states“are, and henceforward shall be free.”The Emancipation Proclamation had a great long-range effect. It reflected a shift in the war objectives of the North—reuniting the nation was no longer the only goal, and represented a major step toward the ultimate abolition of slavery in the United States and a“new birth of freedom”. It gave a high moral purpose to the struggle and strengthened the Union both militarily and politically. As a milestone along the road to slavery's final destruction, the Emancipation Proclamation has assumed a place among the great documents of human freedom.

The Union victory at Gettysburg in July of 1863 ended the South's last chance for military victory. The Battle of Gettysburg was one of the most critical battles of the Civil War. The cost of the battle was high—the North had 23,000 casualties and the South, 28,000. No more men fought and died in any other battle before or since on the land of North America. The battle ended Confederate hopes of formal recognition by foreign governments. The tide of war began to turn against the South. On November 19, 1863, President Lincoln dedicated a portion of the Gettysburg battlefield as a national cemetery, and delivered“Gettysburg Address”to the throng of fifteen thousand for two minutes. The short speech has come to be regarded as the best remembered speech of the Civil War and one of the best speeches in American history.

In March 1864 Lincoln made Ulysses S. Grant commander of all the Union armies. The President had finally found a military genius to match Lee. Under Ulysses S. Grant, the Union armies used tactics of attrition（消耗）and total war to deplete Confederate forces. Lee's army surrender to Grant at Appomattox, Virginia on April 9,1865 and within a few weeks, the remaining southern armies also capitulated（投降）. Jefferson Davis was captured on May 10. The last important Confederate force, under General Edmond Kirby-Smith, laid down its arms at New Orleans on May 26. The war was over.

The Civil War resulted in the defeat of the South and the emancipation of the slaves. The war left the South physically and economically devastated.