Causes of Civil War
... win a majority of the Missouri legislature that was to be elected in August, 1854, which would choose the next senator. While Missouri was fighting to be a slave state, Maine was fighting to be a free-slave state. That is what started the fight between what factors were the deciding factors in which were free states and which were slavery states and contributed to the Civil War. As more and more states were entering the Union, they all had different opinions on how slaves should be considered in the state. The bill was reviewed and was changed to Compromise of 1850. The Compromise of 1850 added some new laws. The people who lived in Washington, D.C. could own slaves, but they were not allowed to buy or sell new ones. The South got a new law called the Fugitive Slave Law which said that any slaves escaping from the south to freedom in the north should be returned to their masters. Bounty hunters received a bounty for each slave they returned. Some free black people were captured by bounty hunters and sold as slaves. Any person who did not help a bounty hunter could be punished under the law. Slavery was another large part of why the Civil War started. People had different views on many different things. Slavery was thought by the north to be unequal of all men. The entire reasons that America fought in the American Revolution was to prove that all men were equal. At the Constitutional Convention there were arguments over slavery. Representatives of the Northern states claimed that if the Southern slaves were mere property, then they should not be counted toward voting representation in Congress. The South came up with the idea of 3/5 compromise. The 3/5 compromise meant that 3/5 of a states slaves counted in their population determining how many representatives the state could have in the House of Representatives. This compromise increased the South's representation in the House of Representatives. The method was thought up by James Madison. In 1800, half of the population in the United States lived in the South. Most people in the North had no opinion about slavery. But there were also people who hated it and felt strongly about how morally unjust it was. Most of the problems were caused by moral issues. People from both North and South felt that it was unequal rights and cruel treatment. Most people who did want slavery in the North only wanted it so they could make a profit. Slave trading was a very good and fairly easy way to make a lot fast money. Because there were more representatives in the House from the North than the South, the South felt they only had one option. The South decided to secede. The Unionist response was that the Preamble of the Constitution stated that the Union derived its power from the people as a whole, and they could prevent them from seceding. The invention of the cotton gin helped the South out because it was a faster way for the slaves to pick cotton. Slavery was protected under the constitution, and was practically impossible to abolish it. Slavery was only a small part of the picture. The issue of unequal power was another large issue. This was illustrated by the crisis over Western Expansion, where North and South opposed each othe...