OPINION: The causes of the U.S. Civil War were complex

Recently, a political controversy was in the news regarding the cause of the Civil War. Republican presidential candidate, and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, was accused of not stating that slavery was the cause of the rebellion. Although my 11th grade U.S. History class is far away in my rear view mirror, I was surprised to see various news accounts implying that the moral objection to slavery is now accepted as the primary cause of the southern revolt. That is not my recollection of the teachings of my high school class, so I decided to see if my memory is faulty. It is not.

A little research indicates that the correct answer to the causation of the war between the states was mostly economic concerns flowing from the institution of slavery, with the added elements of the abolition movement — in other words, the moral objection to slavery — and the political matter of Republican Abraham Lincoln’s election.

For example, the PBS website “History Detectives” explains:

“What led to the outbreak of the bloodiest conflict in the history of North America?

• A common explanation is that the Civil War was fought over the moral issue of slavery.
• In fact, it was the economics of slavery and political control of that system that was central to the conflict.
• A key issue was states’ rights.
• The Southern states wanted to assert their authority over the federal government so they could abolish federal laws they didn’t support, especially laws interfering with the South’s right to keep slaves and take them wherever they wished.
• Another factor was territorial expansion.
• The South wished to take slavery into the western territories, while the North was committed to keeping them open to white labor alone.
• Meanwhile, the newly formed Republican party, whose members were strongly opposed to the westward expansion of slavery into new states, was gaining prominence.
• The election of a Republican, Abraham Lincoln, as President in 1860 sealed the deal. His victory, without a single Southern electoral vote, was a clear signal to the Southern states that they had lost all influence.
• Feeling excluded from the political system, they turned to the only alternative they believed was left to them: secession, a political decision that led directly to war.”

Also, an exam tutorial for AP U.S. History students advises that the causes of the Civil War were: the southern slave economy, based on the raw products of tobacco and cotton; the failure of the Missouri Compromise (creating a border limiting new slave state admittance to the union); the North’s desire to impose tariffs, which the South saw as hurting its sale of raw goods to foreign countries; the concept of “popular sovereignty” (allowing new states to vote as to whether to be a slave state); and the election of Republican Abraham Lincoln, whom the South thought would ban slavery altogether, even though he promised the South that he would not, Lincoln was so reviled there that his name was not even on the ballot of southern states for the 1860 presidential election. All of these primary factors leading to the American Civil War are economic or political in nature.

Interestingly enough, South Carolina sought nullification to deal with the federal law providing for tariffs, with which it disagreed, a move which was swiftly put down by President Andrew Jackson. This is a historical fact about which a former South Carolina governor would know.

Finally, there is the factor of the moral objection to slavery. This is evidenced by the abolition movement with the key players being Frederick Douglass, John Brown and the novel “Uncle Tom’s Cabin,” which opened Northerners’ eyes to the abomination of the institution of slavery.

Therefore, I would respectfully suggest that Haley’s answer was largely correct. According to the Wall Street Journal, “Calling it not an ‘easy question,’ Haley said the cause was ‘basically how government was gonna run — the freedoms and what people could and couldn’t do ... We need to make sure that we do all things so that individuals have the liberties so that they can have freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom to do or be anything they want to be without government getting in the way.’”

According to the lessons taught in American high school history classes, her answer was an acceptable summation to a complex historical question.

Ann Brown serves as the chairwoman of the Alaska Republican Party. Her opinions are her own.

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