Civil War Sectionalism

America was a divided nation during the Civil War, starting in 1861 and ending in 1865, the battles were fought on Northern and Southern lands. The Union was faced with eleven states in the South for secession, who wanted nothing more than to be disconnected from the United States. This war was fueled by many disputes, sectionalism being the leading cause. Sectionalism within the United States hindered unity within the country due to expansion issues and conflicting views on slavery. Sectionalism started division when all the territorial issues came into the picture. In 1845, at the end of Tyler’s Presidency, Texas became a part of the country. Tyler felt that the annexation was the correct decision for the time because he was leaving office,
In 1850 the law was passed with a strict interpretation, if a runaway slave escapes to a Northern state, they can be captured, and be returned to their Southern owners. Southerners were beyond happy with his new law, mostly because these cases were put under the jurisdiction of the federal government, so Northerners had to oblige to the law. Also, if a free African American is captured they were denied the right of trial by jury, so any African American could be put into slavery. Northerners felt they were useless, due to they could not do anything about Southerners traveling to free states to capture African Americans, so slavery contributed to further dividing the Nation into two. In hopes of Southerners seeing the wrongs of slavery, Harriet Beecher Stowe, a Northerner, wrote Uncle Tom’s Cabin. A fictional story that follows the life of a slave named Tom, showing the horrors of some slave owners and what slaves dealt with in their lifetime. Northerners were impressed and pleased with Stowe’s story, but Southerners were horrified by the writing thought it was vicious propaganda. North and South not seeing eye to eye on the issue of slavery, only brought more sectionalism to the Nation. Slavery issues continue into 1854 with the Kansas-Nebraska Act, Stephen A. Douglas introduced a bill in hopes of expanding slavery, that would split the Nebraska territory into two, the Nebraska Territory and Kansas territory, and allow the settlers to decide whether slavery is permitted or not, also known as popular sovereignty. Northerners saw this as giving into slavery, ironically President Pierce signs the bill into a law. An event occurred because of the signing, Bleeding Kansas, “Border Ruffians” arrived from Missouri in hopes of winning Kansas for the South and antislavery farmers from the Midwest migrated hoping for a free state. Soon enough fighting broke out between the two groups,