sectionalism between north and south essays

Sectionalism was in fact a major element of the civil war. At the risk of oversimplifying, the strongest conflict was between the Northeastern industrial states (New England, New York, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey), and the South, ( basically the 11 states that made up the Confederacy). In addition, there were two other sections: the Midwest, and border states such as Maryland, Delaware, Kentucky, and Missouri. President Thomas Jefferson (a Virginian), feared that the Midwestern states (and Middle South: states such as Tennessee and Mississippi), might try to break away from the 13 colonies and form a connection, either among themselves, along the Ohio and Mississippi rivers, or with British Canada over the Great Lakes, and down the St. Lawrence River. That's why he was so eager to purchase New Orleans to mollify them. (He actually made the Louisiana purchase.) Other Southerners initially felt that the agricultural (food-producing) Midwest would find common cause with the agricultural (cash crop) South against Northeastern industrial and banking interests. In this regard, the Mississippi River might unite the Midwest and South, against the Northeast. But the building of the Erie canal connecting the Great Lakes and the Hudson River pushed the Midwest agricultural trade to the Northeast. The Midwesterners found that Northeasterners needed more (and paid better for) their wheat than the South, which preferred its own corn. Also, Northeastern woolens suited the cold climate Midwest better than Southern cotton (in the days before central heating). And Midwesterners felt that southern slave (and cash crop) agriculture undercut their (food) farming practices, and therefore considered the South competitive with, rather than complementary to themselves. Hence, the Midwest ultimately sided with the Northeast in the Civil War. The rift between slave and free agriculture was.
In the days leading up to the Civil W President Abraham Lincoln is quoted as saying A house divided against itself cannot stand. What did he mean by this? Clearly he was saying that the United States of America had to remain just that, united. In order to continue to exist as a nation we had to truly be unified. What Lincoln was reacting to were the many conflicts that were dividing this great nation. We call these divisions sectionalism. For the class reading and handout on sectionalism click here. I. Sectionalism Divides America A. Sectionalism - the placing of the needs of one section of thenatio over the needs of the whole nation. 1. The different sections at this time were the North and the South. The West was also a section but this section (because it was new) did not practice sectionalism. Instead it was the other sections that fought to control the destiny of the west. B. What was the difference between the two sections? 1. The North - primarily industrial in nature. Business and industry played major roles. While the North was not know for its agricultural production it was the largest producer of grain. Life was faster and commerce important. 2. The South - primarily agricultural. The soutthern economy was primarily based upon the existence of large family farms known as plantations. The plantation economy relied on cheap labor in the form of slaves to produce tobacco and then cotton. The plantation lifestyle produced a slower more leisrly lifestyle. Farmers on the plantation did not do the work themsleves. They were referred to as the gentleman farmer. C. What issues created the sectional conflict? 1. Slavery - first and foremost the most important difference between the north and south was slavery. For the most part most northerners really didn't care about slavery in the beginning but as time went on slavery, the existence of it as well as the extension.
Enter Your Search Terms to Get Started! Sectionalism Between the War of 1812 and 1828 many events took place that divided the still embryonic and developing United States into different sections with their own specifics interests and priorities. In 1816 Monroe was elected president. He went on a goodwill tour of the United States and brought about a feeling of nationalism and harmony to everyone. This was known as the Era of Good Feelings. Yet this was also the same time when the seeds of sectionalism began to germinate, and within a few years time, the country would be drastically divided. The birth of sectionalism began in December 1814 during the Hartford Convention. The Hartford Convention was a meeting of Federalists from New England to protest the War of 1812 and to revise the Constitution. The Federalists saw the war as “impolitic, improper, and unjust.” They rebelled by encouraging banks not to lend money to the government, by trading with Britain, and by not supplying militia. Some extremists even wanted to separate themselves from the Union! Obviously, the Federalists had a different view than the rest of the country about this whole issue; they were becoming very unpopular fast. The extremists were controlled by moderates, and before this secret convention was over, news of an American Victory arrived and the Federalists were discredited. One issue that helped bring about sectionalism in the U.S. was the tariffs. Due to the war, Congress was forced to double all tariffs; yet after the war was over, high tariffs still remained. The North and some of thewest were all for these tariffs which boomed their manufacturing and textile industries and protected them from foreign competition. The south, however, had a different point of view on this issue. They did not favor protective tariffs because they had no industry and they exported all of their cotton and.
In national politics, sectionalism is loyalty to the interests of one's own region or section of the country, rather than to the country as a whole. It is often a precursor to separatism.[1] Contents 1 In the United States 2 Further reading 3 References 4 External links In the United States[edit] Sectionalism in 1800s America refers to the different lifestyles, social structures, customs, and political values of the North, South, and West.[2][3] It increased steadily in 1800–1850 as the North industrialized, urbanized and built prosperous factories, while the deep South concentrated on plantation agriculture based on slave labor, together with subsistence farming for poor whites who owned no slaves. Southerners defended slavery in part by claiming that Northern factory workers toiled under worse conditions and were not cared for by their employers. Defenders of slavery referred to factory workers as the white slaves of the North. Meanwhile, Northern industrialists and workers benefited from the slave system, even as Northern politicians and religious leaders denounced it. The South expanded into rich new lands in the Southwest (from Alabama to Texas).[4] However, slavery declined in the border states and could barely survive in cities and industrial areas (it was fading out in cities such as Baltimore, Louisville and St. Louis), so a South based on slavery was rural and non-industrial. On the other hand, as the demand for cotton grew the price of slaves soared, as slaves were considered imperative for the harvest and refinement of cotton. Historians have debated whether economic differences between the industrial Northeast and the agricultural South helped cause the Civil War. Most historians now disagree with the economic determinism of historian Charles Beard in the 1920s and emphasize that Northern and Southern economies were largely complementary.[5] Historians.
Causes of Sectionalism in American HistroyThe Missouri Compromise is commonly thought of as the beginning of American sectionalism, although the signs were visible long before 1819. The crisis solved by the compromise certainly alerted the South for the need for political unity in order to maintain its way of life in the face of a more populous North. Likewise, it alerted both regions to the political problems inherent in westward expansion. The Missouri Compromise did not create sectionalism, but it is important as the first possible signs of sectionalist differences in the US. The Missouri Compromise was also important because it was successful, unlike future compromises. The Missouri compromise was successful for a number of reasons, not just because Congress was perfectly willing to leave the question of further state admission petitions to be solved at a later date. It also worked because neither the North nor the South could imagine territories north of the 36'30 line would desire a slavery system for reasons of land and weather patterns. The South was willing to accept the immediate fact of Missouri's entrance into the Union rather than argue over the logistics of the “compromise.” Slavery had yet to become a matter of pride for the South, and the South had yet to feel the growing anger by radical abolitionists in the North. The Missouri Compromise was faithfully followed for almost thirty years, until the territories the US annexed during the Mexican War once again brought up the question of congressional power to limit slavery. There was a forever prohibited clause which comes up again later in the antebellum period, with the Compromise of 1850 and debates about constitutionality. After the Missouri Compromise, Southerners became extremely suspicious concerning the expansion of federal power. The forever prohibited clause was a serious statement about.
One issue, however, exacerbated the regional and economic differences between North and South: slavery. Resenting the large profits amassed by Northern businessmen from marketing the cotton crop, Southerners attributed the backwardness of their own section to Northern aggrandizement. Northerners, on the other hand, declared that slavery -- the peculiar institution, which the South regarded as essential to its economy -- was wholly responsible for the region's relative backwardness. As far back as 1830, sectional lines had been steadily hardening on the slavery question. In the North, abolitionist feeling grew more and more powerful, abetted by a free-soil movement vigorously opposed to the extension of slavery into the Western regions not yet organized as states. To Southerners of 1850, slavery was a condition for which they felt no more responsible than for their English speech or their representative institutions. In some seaboard areas, slavery by 1850 was well over 200 years old; it was an integral part of the basic economy of the region. Only a minority of Southern whites owned slaves. In 1860 there were a total of 46,274 planters throughout the slave-holding states, with a planter defined as someone who owned at least 20 slaves. More than half of all slaves worked on plantations. Some of the yeoman farmers, 70 percent of whom held less than 40 hectares, had a handful of slaves, but most had none. The poor whites lived on the lowest rung of Southern society and held no slaves. It is easy to understand the interest of the planters in slave holding -- they owned most of the slaves. But the yeomen and poor whites supported the institution of slavery as well. They feared that if freed, blacks would compete with them for land. Equally important, the presence of slaves raised the standing of the yeomen and the poor whites on the social scale; they would not willingly.