The Causes Of The Civil War
...history and the cause or causes of the war are hotly debated. Interpretations as to why the war between the states have evolved over time, from the arguments of historian and future vice president Henry Wilson shortly after the conclusion of the war to the arguments of current scholars in the field, the causes of the war have been a popular topic for scholars, politicians and the general public.
In his three-volume set, History of the Rise and Fall of the Slave Power in America, published from 1872-1877, Henry Wilson was probably the first historian to address the issue of the causes of the Civil War. Although he was vice president under Ulysses S. Grant at the time of publication, he wrote the book while serving as a Republican senator from Massachusetts. Although he is regarded as a historian, Wilson's party identification showed in his work, as he basically offered the same explanation for the Civil War as did the country's first Republican president -- Abraham Lincoln. Wilson argued that slavery was the most important reason the war took place and said that the war was fought over a moral issue -- whether or not it was right to keep human beings in bondage. He also devoted significant time in refuting the Southern argument that the war was based more on the principle of states' rights.
By the turn of the century, the conventional wisdom was beginning to shift away from the argument pioneered in the field of history by Wilson and supported by Hermann von Holst of Johns Hopkins University. A new generation of historians had grown up without any direct knowledge of the Civil War. The newer historians abandoned the blind partisanship of the works of the earlier generations, instead attempting to argue, instead, from a more unbiased point of view. John Bach MacMasters, Edward Channing, Albert Bushnell Hart and James Ford Rhodes were the primary proponents of...
View Full Essay
