Andrzej Chwalba The Civil War

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Fotografia czarno-biała przedstawiająca budynek w którym przeprowadza się aukcje niewolników w Atlancie w stanie Georgia.

The Civil War is often interpreted as a conflict between traditional and agricultural societies opposing the industrial capitalism. The North and the South had an extremely different approach to slavery. In the North, the market economy and industrial society developed, and the population grew. In the South, industry was weak, towns were less numerous, and the main source of wealth was agriculture based on African slaves. Cotton was the main crop. In theory, the ban on slave imports had been in force since 1808, but it was still practised, albeit on a smaller scale. However, the law did not prohibit the possession of slaves. In 11 southern states there were about 4 million Blacks per 9 million inhabitants. In 1860, about 400 thousand families, or ¼ of all Americans from the South owned slaves. The differences between the two parts of America were manifested in the fact that farmers in the North dreamed of increasing their farmland, and in the South - of increasing the number of slaves. Slave escapes were infrequent and revolts rather sporadic; slaves born in captivity passed on a sense of helplessness and passivity to the next generations. Slaves, treated as a useful tool on the farms, were most often illiterate, because the law provisions adopted by white people prohibited teaching Blacks how to read and write.

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Fotografia czarno-biała przedstawiająca Harriet Beecher Stowe - Amerykańską abolicjonistka i autorkę "Wujka Tom's Cabin".

The main reason for the war was the uncompromising demand for the abolition of slavery by the North. Another important reason was the demand for a free labor force in the North, which at that time was „frozen” in slavery. An important role was also played by the growing number of abolitionistabolitionistsabolitionist associations. Various arguments were put forward against slavery, most often religious. Uncle Tom's Cabin, a novel by the American writer and social activist Harriet Stowe Beecher (1811–1896), describing the unfortunate fate of the Blacks, upset the North in 1852 and contributed to the intensification of the movement for the abolition of slavery. Of course, not all northern Yankees were abolitionists, just like not all Southerners supported slavery.

The aggravation of the North‑South conflict resulted in the 1857 Supreme Court decision in the case of the slave Dred Scott, who fled from the South to the North. The decision stated that he was still a slave because he was born as one. Therefore, his new place of residence did not change his legal status. This decision upset many Americans and paved the way for Abraham Lincoln (1809‑1865) to become president. Although born in the slave state of Kentucky, he opposed slavery for religious, moral and economic reasons. When the war began, initiated by the secession of South Carolina and the formation of the Confederacy, the issue of slavery was not immediately addressed, although the fear of its prohibition provoked an attack by the South. On September 22, 1862, Lincoln issued a proclamation that if by January 1, 1863, the states of the Confederacy did not return to the Union, their slaves would become free and would be able to enlist in the US army. As he supposed, President Jefferson Davies' response was negative, which is why Lincoln proclaimed the slavery abolition act. Since then, the war for the unity of the state became a war for human rights.

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Obraz przedstawiający ludność ciemnoskórą biegnącą po polu.

The American Civil War influenced the attitudes of the Black Americans and encouraged them to take their fate into their own hands. The painter Theodore Kaufmann was a German immigrant and abolitionist who served in the Union army during the American Civil War. In „On to Liberty” he depicted a group of refugees from the South. During the war, black men, women and children fled from slavery to the Union camps. They provided manpower and information about the local area and the movements of the Confederacy troops. At the end of the war, almost a million former slaves found themselves under federal protection, many of them in special camps for refugees, which were being established by the Union leaders since 1862. The formal granting of equal rights to the black people was a process that continued long after the end of the American Civil War. In January 1865, the US Congress passed the 13th amendment to the Constitution, abolishing slavery throughout the United States. Already after Lincoln's death, another amendment obliged the people of the South to grant the liberated Blacks civil rights. At the same time, it also deprived all those who performed official or military functions in the Confederacy of such rights. These actions made the division of society stronger and, like the occupation, which served to „reconstruct” the South, made it difficult to reconcile the parties to the conflict. The black population, although in theory equal in rights to the white people, was treated as second‑class citizens. By means of various laws („Black Codes”) which imposed the obligation to conclude annual contracts with landowners, forced labour on plantations, racial segregation and separate education were introduced.

wojna Source: Andrzej Chwalba, The Civil War, [w:] tegoż, Historia powszechna. Wiek XIX, Warszawa 2008.

Abraham Lincoln Pierwsze przemówienie inauguracyjne 4 marca 1861

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Fotografia czarno-biała przedstawiająca portret Abrahama Lincolna.

Część naszego narodu opowiada się za niewolnictwem jako instytucją prawnie usankcjonowaną i dąży do jego legalnej ekspansji, a część uważa niewolnictwo za zło i dąży do jego ograniczenia albo i zniesienia. I w tym tkwi sedno naszego sporu. Obowiązują obok siebie konstytucyjna poprawka dotycząca zbiegłych niewolników i zakaz zagranicznego handlu niewolnikami, jak to się dzieje w społeczności, której zasady moralne w mało doskonały sposób wpływają na stanowione prawo. Znakomita większość ludzi w obu przypadkach przestrzega li tylko suchej litery prawa, nie wdając się w rozważania natury moralnej, a tylko niewielu pozwala sobie prezentować postawę odmienną. Myślę, że to się prędko nie zmieni, a po secesji będzie jeszcze gorzej. Handel niewolnikami, do dziś nie do końca wyrugowany, rozkwitnie na Południu bez ograniczeń, a na Północy zbiegli niewolnicy, teraz tylko częściowo wydawani, byliby chwytani i wydawani co do jednego.

lincoln Source: Abraham Lincoln, Pierwsze przemówienie inauguracyjne 4 marca 1861, [w:] Wielkie mowy historii, t. 2, Warszawa 2006, s. 88.