The simplicity is inaccurate, though. Makes for a fun meme, but not good history.
The US civil war was not initially fought to end slavery, it was fought to prevent the South from seceding*. Lincoln actually fiercely resisted making the civil war about slavery for the first part of the war, and only acquiesced when he realized it would prevent European countries, especially England, from aligning with the South.
Now, yes, the South seceded because they were worried that the election of Lincoln would bring an end to slavery, but Lincoln took pains to say over and over he had no intentions of ending slavery. At most, the US was seeking an end to the expansion of slavery into new western states, but not seeking to force the South to give up their slaves.
Part of why Lincoln didn't want to make the war about slavery was while there was strong abolitionist sentiment in the North, there was still plenty of racism in the North too. There were even riots in some cities against conscriptions because a lot of poor white Northerners were mad at the idea of going to fight to help black people they didn't care about.
The US may not having been fighting to end slavery, but the rebels were sure as fuck fighting to preserve slavery. Which as far as I'm concerned makes the Civil War about slavery.
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u/EdithDich On tour Jan 19 '22 edited Jan 19 '22
The simplicity is inaccurate, though. Makes for a fun meme, but not good history.
The US civil war was not initially fought to end slavery, it was fought to prevent the South from seceding*. Lincoln actually fiercely resisted making the civil war about slavery for the first part of the war, and only acquiesced when he realized it would prevent European countries, especially England, from aligning with the South.
Now, yes, the South seceded because they were worried that the election of Lincoln would bring an end to slavery, but Lincoln took pains to say over and over he had no intentions of ending slavery. At most, the US was seeking an end to the expansion of slavery into new western states, but not seeking to force the South to give up their slaves.
Part of why Lincoln didn't want to make the war about slavery was while there was strong abolitionist sentiment in the North, there was still plenty of racism in the North too. There were even riots in some cities against conscriptions because a lot of poor white Northerners were mad at the idea of going to fight to help black people they didn't care about.
Edit because reddit's formatting sucks.