The American Civil War officially began April 12, 1861, but the crisis had begun in earnest many years before. Some would say as far back as 1619. It was in that year that the first slave ships came to Jamestown, Virginia. From that point forward, African slavery became a central feature of North America's agragrian economy.
By the time of the American Revolution, slavery was firmly entrenched in most of the colonies declaring independence from Great Britain. A majority of the men we know as the "Founding Fathers" were personally opposed to slavery, but they either didn't know what to do with it or they felt there were other pressing priorities to deal with. Still, the anti-slavery Founders (including Alexander Hamilton, John Adams, Ben Franklin, and even some guilt-ridden slave-owning Founders like Thomas Jefferson) made some progress. By the end of the founding era, slavery had been abolished in virtually all the northern states and it had been outlawed in the Northwest Territory. Additionally, the slave trade had been abolished and the institution itself had been morally stigmatized.
With Eli Whitney's cotton gin, however, things began to change. Slavery became even more entrenched in the Deep South, and the modest gains made for abolition in the founding era were forgotten - at least in the South. The nation became much more regionalized, with the northern states pursuing commerce and industry -- and the South agriculture.
As the United States expanded, tenuous bargains were cut between the northern and southern states to maintain a balance of power in the Senate and to protect the economic interests of the slave-holding interests. These compromises averted war, until they began to unravel in the 1850s.
Other than the infamous Dred Scott ruling, the crisis that most lended itself to war was the breakup of the Democratic Party in the months leading to the 1860 presidential election. The Deep South Democrats wanted a federal guarantee of slave territories and new slave states. The Upper South Democrats, led by Stephen Douglas, wanted each state and territory to choose whether it would be free or slave. This split the Democratic Party in half, handing the presidential election to the newly-formed Republican Party. That party, founded in 1854, was committed to halting the expansion of slavery.
The 1860 presidential election was one of the most regionally contested elections in US history. Lincoln's name appeared on virtually NONE of the ballots in the southern states! His election was seen as a precursor to the abolition of slavery itself, and the Deep South wouldn't stand for it. South Carolina led the way, terminating its allegiance to the Constitutional Union. The remaining Deep South states followed, including Texas, which was fairly new to the United States. War hero and now Governor Sam Houston lost his governorship because he stood up to the secessionists. He would die in the middle of the Civil War, heartbroken that his beloved state had removed itself from the United States.
The Upper South, including Virginia, North Carolina, Kentucky, Tennessee, and Maryland, declined to join their slave-holding sister states in the Deep South. They remained loyal to the Union....UNTIL....Lincoln refused to give up Fort Sumter and then began raising an army to invade the Deep South. Virginia, North Carolina, and Tennessee believed this was an unacceptable and tyrannical action on Lincoln's part, and sided with the Confederacy. Maryland was heading in that same direction, but quick (and many would say EXTRA-constitutional - meaning "illegal") action on the part of Mr. Lincoln stopped Maryland from seceding. Had it done so, it would have been disastrous for the US government in Washington, DC.
The American Civil War lasted for four, bloody years - claiming the lives of over 600,000 soldiers on both sides. The additional toll of the wounded and the maimed and those bloodied in spirit was catastrophic.
The United States today continues to live in the shadow of the Civil War - one of the greatest human tragedies in world history.
