El Duderino said:
While I do agree that slavery was not the only issue that lead to the civil war I think its impossible to say Slavery was not a main factor... sure there were many other factors but slavery was a very big one... many european countrys had fromaly abandomed slavery but fact is that people could still be held in slave like conditions by their landlords... to say because there were abolitionist talks in the south proves slavery was going to be forbidden is nothing but speculation... there were also anti-abolitionist in ther North btw... Lincoln wanted america slave free once and for all, he achieved that and we should all be gratefull for that... ( I know it took another hundred years for blacks to have equal rights but the Civil War was a major step in the right direction...)
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In my opinion, the Civil War was NOT a step in the right direction. From a civil liberties/states rights/Jeffersonian standpoint, Lincoln by means of the war did more to advance the power of the federal government, particularly the presidency, than anything aside from FDR's "New Deal".
And while the War did end slavery, I think it only increased racial tension. Imagine the wounded pride Southerners must have felt after the war, especially under the horrible reconstruction imposed by the Radical Republicans. The newly freed black men would've been looked upon as a sign of their defeat, and the Confederates would've taken out their anger on these people. It is why the KKK, aka the Ghosts of the Confederacy, went bad, imo. When you lose at a game, it's not so bad, but when the guy that beat you starts rubbing it in, it starts to piss you off, doesn't it? The freedom of blacks across the South was a physical manifestation of this.
Slavery was slowly dying in the US prior to the war just like it had already died in many other regions. The economic tensions of the 1850s may have spurred the South to push for an expansion of slavery in an effort to increase their political power versus the North, but a freed Confederacy with nothing to fear from from Northern politicians would've had little reason to press the expansion of slavery, and the practice would've eventually ceased much like it had in most other places in the world. And it would've happened peacefully, just like it happened everywhere else.
In the end, everyone would've been better off if Lincoln had just let us go.
