The American Civil War was Unavoidable Essay -- American history, econ

If one thing is clear from studying early American history, it is that the Civil War was an unavoidable tragedy. Often, hindsight allows us to recognize those points at which history could have taken a different direction, if only some person or thing were different in some way. This is not the case with the American Civil War. Four factors support the notion of inevitability. This paper will explore the way that economics, previous compromises, changing social mores and values, and the nature of politics laid a foundation for the continued regional conflict which eventually resulted in the Civil War. The economic aspects often come in second to morality when discussing slavery in the South’s plantation economy, but they are worth considering as they are fundamental to why slavery as an institution became so hard to dismantle. Slavery kept plantations partially immune from market fluctuations. Having no labor costs allowed the Southern, less diversified economy to be competitive with the North and European countries. For this reason, slavery became a crucial factor in keeping many industries viable and profitable, including primary and secondary manufacturing, transportation, shipping, and public sector jobs such as infrastructure construction (Starobin, 1970). The South’s financial success was built on a foundation of slave labor, and for this reason, the government had an incentive for the active promotion and protection of slavery. Laws were written to help maintain the institution because without it, the economy would likely have faltered significantly. Early c olonial laws such as the Navigation Acts gave slavery conditions under which it thrived and grew (Post, 1982). The Constitution’s Three-Fifths clause was a... ...continue in this country and around the world to this day. Works Cited History Detectives. (n.d.). Web. 10 Nov. 2015. http://www.pbs.org/opb/historydetectives/feature/causes-of-the-civil-war/ Justice. (n.d.). Web. 10 Nov. 2015. http://academic.udayton.edu/race/03justice/aalaws01.htm Post, C. (1982). The American road to capitalism. New Left Review, 133(1), 30-51. Roark, J.L., Johnson, M. P., Cohen, P. C., Stage, S., Lawson, A., Hartmann, S. M. (2009). The American Promise: A History of the United States to 1877. Boston, MA: Bedford/St. Martin’s. Starobin, R. (1970). The economics of Slavery in the Old South. The Business History Review, Vol. 44 (2). 131-174.http://www.jstor.org/stable/3112351 Trigger events of the Civil War. (n.d.). Web. 10 Nov. 2015. http://www.civilwar.org/education/history/civil-war-overview/triggerevents.html