The Rise and Fall of the Confederacy Slavery had been in the United States since before we became our own country. Slavery was a major part of life. In the 19th century, the South was a major force in the nation’s economy. Slave labor was needed to pick the cotton and tobacco crops which were Americas two major exports at that time. In the North, the American Revolution proved a powerful argument against slavery. Starting with Vermont in 1777, eventually all the Northern states became free. Even though states like New York, Rhode Island and New Jersey had some strong opposition to abolition, by the 1820’s virtually all the slaves were in the South. Between 1790 and 1860 approximately 1,000,000 slaves moved west/southwest. That’s just a percentage of the slaves that stayed in the southeastern region of the United States. It seemed like the country was going along perfect. The land size, population and income were all really growing --- and so were the number of slaves. When the North became free there soon was a higher rate of runaway slaves, as could be expected. But as more renegades started forming escape routes, (like the Underground Railroad) the Southern slaveholders felt they had to do something to show all the slaves that runaways were not tolerated. Burning, lynching and shooting of slaves was not uncommon and tensions between the North and the South grew even more. As the movement to abolish slavery spread through the states, people in the North started to demoralize slavery. This was just the beginning. The next step was to separate the farming, slaveholding states of the South, from the urban non-slaveholding states of the North. This sounded like it was a great idea. There were equal numbers of free and equal numbers of slave states. The Missouri Compromise helped increased the tension between the North and South by keeping the number of free and slaves states equal. Peaceful coexistence could not last forever. The Southerners eventually felt they had to form some kind of group to protect slavery. They held several meetings and then finally on December 20th of 1860, the southern states of Arkansas, Tennessee, Missouri, Louisiana, Georgia and Alabama joined the Union of Confederate States of America. Four more states would join. The Confederacy was born. This eleven state alliance believed strongly that slavery is how God intended it to be. In most Southerner’s opinions, people who opposed slavery were confused, evil people. These 11 states sent representatives to a convention were they adopted a constitution and chose Jefferson Davis as president and Alexander Hamilton Stephens as vice president. Their constitution prohibited slave trade but allowed state to state slave commerce. All other states remained a part of the Union. When Jefferson Davis became the Confederate president he was 53 years old. He had served in the army during the Mexican-American War, served in Congress and in the Senate. Educated at Transalvania University in Kentucky, ( how ironic that Lincoln and Davis were raised so close to one another and still had such different views) his first task was to prepare for the impending conflict of slavery and separation from the United States of America. The war officially began when the Confederacy demanded Fort Sumter to surrender. The Union leader there refused and the Confederacy fired on the fort for two days until they surrendered. Between December 30th, 1860 and February 28th, 1861, the Confederacy managed to seize 11 federal forts from North Carolina to Texas. With General Robert E. Lee on their side the South had a greater military advantage. But with the North having three times as many people and all the weapons and supplies, it looked like the South would have to put up a pretty big fight. Put up a big fight? Oh, the South seemed to do just that. Lincoln couldn’t seem to pick a decent General to lead his army and the North, who had all the advantages, was losing most of the battles. Even if they did win, Northerners would not take the chance to capitalize on their resources and advantages. The Confederate’s high hopes of becoming a separate nation were looking much better than Lincoln or Davis ever expected. But eventually the supply of soldiers started running out on both sides. The South began to use their slaves for fighting. The North used free black people to fight. Both Union and Confederate armies eventually turned to the draft. Drafting caused a lot of riots due to the fact that the war casualty rates were so high. Young men were not eager to die. In 1863 some of the western counties of Virginia formed their own state of West Virginia and supported the Union. That same year the Union was able to take control of Vicksburg and eventually the Mississippi River, splitting the South in half. Also passed at this time was the Emancipation Proclamation, which made slavery illegal everywhere in the United States. The South simply said that they were not a part of the Union and did not have to follow any of their laws. In the Fall of 1864, Lincoln was up for re-election for president in the North. The whole country had little hopes of him winning. The Democratic Party even suggested that he drop out of the race and have another candidate take his place. Lincoln declined and moved forward. He worked on making the Emancipation Proclamation an amendment to the Constitution so that if he did not win, it could still be there. The Union had already started to win the battles of Mobile Bay, Atlanta and Nashville and had gotten very close to capturing Richmond, the Southern capital. The South’s hopes of Lincoln being re-placed by a pro-slavery president was nothing more than a dream now. And the Confederates would cease to see many more victories due to their growing lack of supplies and men. A major victory for the North came when Union General William Sherman marched on Savannah, causing it to surrender without a fight. Generals Sherman and Grant then met with President Lincoln to make plans for the final campaign. Lincoln’s objective was to bring the war to an end with no more bloodshed than necessary. On April 2, 1865, General Grant ordered an assault on Richmond. Lee had time to make an orderly withdrawal from the city. The Federal troops entered the abandoned city the next day. The Civil War ended in April of 1865 after 5 years of battle. When Richmond was captured, President Davis fled the city. Finally on May 10th, 1865, federal troops captured him in Irwinville, Georgia. From 1865 to 1867 he was imprisoned at Fortress Monroe in Virginia. Davis was convicted of Treason in 1866 but a year later he was released on a bond of $100,000 signed by American Newspaper publisher Horace Greeley and other influential Northerners. In 1881 he published a book called The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government. The Confederacy would not live on. In 1869, the United States Supreme Court, in the case of Texas vs White, declared secession unconstitutional. The United States was left to fix what the Civil War had done. The South was left financially and industrially ruined at the close of the war. The process of restoring the Confederacy to the Union was called Reconstruction and cost millions of dollars. Sadly, the Civil War did not give blacks the equality that whites were given. The fight for equality still continues today.
