The Civil War became a war to end slavery as the North realized defeating the Confederacy required undermining the economic and ideological foundations of the South, which were built on slavery. Lincoln initially aimed only to preserve the Union, but came to issue the Emancipation Proclamation, freeing slaves in Confederate states, both to weaken the South and motivate slaves to join the Northern war effort. By making the end of slavery a central war goal, the North was able to target the root cause of secession and gain a new source of troops, ensuring the South's defeat and slavery's demise.

1. Why did the Civil War become a war to end slavery?
Prior to the Civil War, the issue of slavery was an on-going political battle
between politicians of the North and South. The concept of liberty differed
between those that supported slavery and abolitionists in the lead up to Civil
War. The South fought for freedom as set up by the founding fathers whereas the
North fought for the ideals of the constitution. This war would take a turn, in
which the North would eventually face the central issue of the war, the position
of slaves in society. At the heart of the conflict was the issue of slavery in the new
western lands. In disagreeing on the outcome, Civil War would determine the
path the United States would take, and the example to the world that it would
set.
The causes of the Civil War lie in the failure of North and South to compromise
on the issue of slavery. Slavery had been a dominant feature of United States
politics, with the North and South settling on compromises that only worked to
postpone rather than avert the war, such as the Compromise of 1850 in which
California was entered as a free state, yet Utah and New Mexico would have
unrestricted conditions for slavery1 and the Crittenden Compromise of 1860
which would allow slavery south of the Missouri Compromise line. Lincoln’s
opposition of the Crittenden Compromise for ceding too much to the South with
regard to slavery in new western lands abandoned any last hope for averting
war, and with the north and south so far apart, it was eminent that a Civil War
would take place.
Both North and South fought the war over constitutional rights. The Confederacy
fought for their perceived vision of the founding fathers’ declaration of
independence, to protect and preserve their way of life from the northern
invaders, while the North found itself fighting for the ideals of the revolution,
where liberty was truly universal and the United States would set an example for
the world. As Manning points out “Northerners honestly believed that the
government founded by the revolutionary generation had to survive in order to
prove to the world that republican self-government can work.”2 This was a vision
in which the Declaration of Independence was truly universal and not just for the
white settlers. However, as Foner mentions about the southern states, “Whites
defined their freedom, in part, by their distance from slavery”3, meaning their
interpretation of constitutional rights differed from the North, on a basis that the
white settlers were superior to the slaves, and needed to harness this labour in a
way which would allow them to compete with the emerging industrial economy
of the North.
Slavery was the driving force behind the Confederacy, so upon wagering war on
behalf of the freedom of slaves, the North worked to undermine the very core of
the southern way of life. Georgia’s reason for seceding from the Union resulted
1 Readings in American Constitutional History, 414
2 Manning, Chandra. 2012. "All for the Union…and Emancipation, too. What the Civil War Was
About."
3 Foner, Give Me Liberty, 432

2. from the fear of the North imposing on their independence, believing that “their
avowed purpose is to subvert our society and subject us not only to the loss of
our property but the destruction of ourselves, our wives, and our children, and
the desolation of our homes, our altars, and our firesides.”4 This view points out
the perspective of the Confederacy: having Union forces invading their lands and
ceasing their property. Fear for their collective well-being had bonded the
Confederate together against the Union. Slaves made up the majority of the
southern economy, as Mississippi says in its secession declaration “Our position
is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery-- the greatest material
interest of the world.”5 The South was fighting to protect a way of life they saw as
set up by the founding fathers, one in which slavery was the backbone of society,
allowing for the white settlers to dominate the land as superiors.
The passing of the Second Confiscation and Militia act in July 1862 made slaves
contraband of war, immediately freeing them from the obligations they have to
their master if they secede to the Union.6 Having confronted the “fountain of the
quarrel”7, the North would now be able to use the slaves for their own
emancipation, recruiting them into the Union army and naval forces. The
Emancipation Declaration can be seen to have resulted in a massive recruitment
campaign for black soldiers, giving Lincoln a solution to the problem of
integrating ex-slaves who came up from the south into Northern society. Having
abandoned the Confederacy, they are welcomed as free people in the Union. As
an incentive to join the war effort against their former oppressors, the Union
army issued a condition, which would allow the family of an ex-slave who joined
the Union army to be free citizens of the US. In freeing slaves on Confederate
lands, the Emancipation Declaration attacks the engine behind the southern war
effort, without slave labour to do most of the work; the Confederacy is reduced
to a standstill. However, the Emancipation Proclamation didn’t free all of the
slaves at once. It only applied to Confederate lands that weren’t controlled by the
Union, and being a wartime document had to be reiterated after the Civil War in
the Thirteenth Amendment.
However, Lincoln didn’t have the emancipation of slaves on his agenda from the
outset of the war. Foner argues this is because he didn’t want to isolate the
Border States whose support was vital in the Northern war effort.8 This shows
the strategic importance of a stance on slavery, and the only way for slaves to get
emancipation would be to make them part of the war effort. The South had a
common ideology, where the Confederate troops fought for a common cause to
protect the southern way of life. Lincoln realised the North needed a universal
binding force also, urging him to pay attention to the importance of the slaves
and their usefulness as an ideology, in battle, and their use in undermining the
4 A Declaration of the Immediate Causes which Induce and Justify the Secession of the State of
Georgia from the Federal Union.
5 A Declaration of the Immediate Causes which Induce and Justify the Secession of the State of
Mississippi from the Federal Union.
6 Readings in American Constitutional History. 502-507
7 Readings in American Constitutional History. 502-507
8 Foner, Give Me Liberty, 548

3. power of the Confederation. The call for liberty on both sides relied heavily on
the constitution. The South believed that slavery should continue to exist as it
did at the time of the founding fathers; however, the North also draws on the
constitution in saying that every man is born equal. Having taken Lincoln two
years in office to issue to Emancipation Proclamation shows that he didn’t
always hold a steady view of the issue of slavery in the United States, and that he
would manipulate it as a political tool for Northern support and as a way to win
the war. “If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I
could save the Union by freeing all the slaves I would do it. And if I could save it
by freeing some and leaving others alone, I would also do that.”9 The Civil War
became a war on slavery as a means by which the South could be defeated. By
eradicating the central cause of the conflict, the North would use the pile-over of
free blacks in their own aim of preserving the Union.
The Civil war became a war on slavery in order to target the cause of the conflict
and its main driving force. By emancipating the slaves, Lincoln eradicated the
most important obstacle in defeating the south. By handing over the war to those
that wanted their freedom the most, Lincoln not only undermined the
confederate capacity for war, but also gained considerable troop numbers for his
own cause. In the second inaugural address, Lincoln concedes that neither side
could foresee that “the cause of the conflict might cease with or even before the
conflict itself should cease” 10with regards to the interest which the slaves
possess for both North and South in the course of the war. The answer to the
Civil War lay in its problem, and with Lincoln’s political manipulation allowed it
to be the binding ideology of the North.
9 “13th Amendment Site
http://13thamendment.harpweek.com/hubpages/CommentaryPage.asp?Commentary=04Eman
Proc
10 Abraham Lincoln, Second Inaugural Address

4. Bibliography:
Abraham Lincoln, Second Inaugural Address; endorsed by Lincoln, April 10, 1865,
March 4, 1865; Series 3, General Correspondence, 1837-1897; The Abraham
Lincoln Papers at the Library of Congress, Manuscript Division (Washington, DC:
American Memory Project, [2000-02]),
http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/alhtml/alhome.html (accessed 23/10/12)
A Declaration of the Immediate Causes which Induce and Justify the Secession of
the State of Georgia from the Federal Union.
Copied by Justin Sanders from the Official Records, Ser IV, vol 1, pp. 81-85
A Declaration of the Immediate Causes which Induce and Justify the Secession of
the State of Mississippi from the Federal Union
Copied by Justin Sanders from "Journal of the State Convention", (Jackson, MS: E.
Barksdale, State Printer, 1861), pp. 86-88
Foner, Eric. “Give me liberty!: an American history”. New York: W.W. Norton & Co.
2008. Ebook.
Manning, Chandra. 2012. "All for the Union…and Emancipation, too. What the Civil
War Was About." Dissent (00123846) 59, no. 1: 91-95. EBSCOhost (accessed
October 25, 2012)
Readings in American Constitutional History, 1776-1876. Boston; New York,
c1912. The Making of Modern Law. Gale. 2012. Gale, Cengage Learning.
http://galenet.galegroup.com/servlet/MOML?af=RN&ae=F151361859&srchtp=
a&ste=14 (accessed 25/10/12)
“13th Amendment Site”
http://13thamendment.harpweek.com/hubpages/CommentaryPage.asp?Commentary=
04EmanProc (accessed 24/10/12)