Advantages And Disadvantages Of The Civil War Compromise

Essay #2: When the Civil War struck, it proved to be a failure of the North and South’s abilities to compromise. In the previous years, the nation had always managed to reconcile is sectional differences. Compromises were constantly being made, and even as late as 1850, the nation was still able to make compromises to keep itself together. In the light of the Civil War, another compromise had emerged, the Crittenden Compromise. However, these were rejected and the nation plunged into war. They year 1861 happened to different in several ways, making it impossible for compromise to be reached before the start of the Civil War. One of the most important factors that played into the inability of the North and South to compromise was the introduction of literature. Writers during this period helped craft a mentality against slavery, which the South resented. This started with the works of Harriet Beecher Stowe, who wrote Uncle Tom’s Cabin. For the first, the North saw the Africans as human and capable of emotions and good faith. This upset the South, which wanted to …show more content…
Literature published during the time only pitched the North and the South against each other by exposing the disadvantages of slavery and the moral wrong. Fence sitters on the issue of slavery, along with many minds in Europe, were turned against the South. The Panic of 1857 gave the South confidence it needed to secede, as it felt that the North was dependent on its business and cotton in order to prosper. Likewise, the election of Lincoln, who was against the expansion of slavery, and the execution of John Brown did nothing to appease the South or North during this period. Both sides were torn apart and had reasons to despise the other. With Lincoln’s final, wise decision to turn down the Crittenden Compromise, the North and South would enter the bloodiest conflict in American