Abraham Lincolns Role in the Civil War Term Paper

Abraham Lincolns Role in the Civil War - Term Paper Example Enslavement, nevertheless, was the chief cause of the ever-increasing political conflict and opposition around the 1850s.There were numerous leaders who greatly contributed to the development and, eventually, the conclusion of this four-year war that killed millions of innocent lives. They, in many ways, have shaped and formed what is known as The Civil War today. Whether to instigate or to stifle the war, these leaders have unquestionably played a great part in it. Among these leaders was President Abraham Lincoln. He, throughout his presidency, has greatly molded and influenced the development and the end of this war. He, in a way, played a role in both the start and end of the Civil War. Many factors indeed instigated the Civil War. The trigger that ultimately pushed war into action was Abraham Lincoln’s victory in the presidential elections. During the presidential election of 1860, the Republican Party spearheaded by Abraham Lincoln had pushed against magnifying slavery o utside the states in which it previously subsisted.The Republicans intensely promoted patriotism, and in their 1860 manifesto they denounced disunion threats as affirmations of treason. This fervent drive to abolish slavery sprung from President Lincoln’s belief that slavery was the main cause of the war. In his second inaugural address, he said, "These slaves constituted a peculiar and powerful interest. All knew that this interest was somehow the cause of the war.†1 In retort to an anti-slavery Republican as the winner of the Presidential election, nearly a dozen Southern slave states in America affirmed their separation and breakaway from the United States. Many of these Southern whites that belonged to the Confederacy felt that secession had grown to be their only choice, as the people understood that Lincoln was against slavery and approved of Northern appeals. Together, they formed the Confederate States of America, better known universally as the Confederacy. Bot h the leaving presidency of President James Buchanan and the entering government disallowed the validity of secession, regarding it as rebellion. The other eight slave states turned pleas for secession down at this point. There was no nation in the world that acknowledged the Confederacy. As the Confederacy formed, the remaining twenty-five states reinforced the federal administration known collectively as the Union. Conflicts started on the April of 1861, when Confederate powers struck a U.S. military installation located at Fort Sumter in Charleston, South Carolina. After they severely bombarded the fort, the fort surrendered. A few days later, Lincoln called for a multitude that numbered around 75,000 from the states to recapture the fort and additional national property. Instead of furnishing troops for an assault on their fellow Southern states, North Carolina, Virginia, Arkansas, and Tennessee made a decision to join these states in withdrawal. Lincoln’s response of cal ling for a legion of volunteers led to statements of secession by these four slave states. This reaction to Ft. Sumter was a devastating call for war to support national morality. Only the state of Kentucky made an effort to stay neutral. A congregation of young men all throughout the land was in a great rush to enlist. Both sides built armies as the Union grasped control of the Border States during the early phases of the war and formed a naval barrier. Land combat in the East was indecisive between 1861 and 1862, as the Confederacy retorted Union efforts to seize its capital, Richmond, Virginia, particularly throughout the Peninsular Campaign. In the September of 1862, the Confederate movement in Maryland terminated in defeat at the