The immediate cause of the Civil War was the election of Abraham Lincoln. Four other and more fundamental causes include deep disagreement between advocates of slave ownership and abolitionists, the conflict between North and South over the rights of a state in the Union, social and economic differences between North and South, and whether it was constitutional to secede from the Union. [1]
Dixie's Constitution
By the end of March, 1861, the Confederacy had created a constitution and elected its first and only president, Jefferson Davis. The Constitution of the Confederate States of America was the supreme law of the Confederate States of America, as adopted on March 11, 1861 and in effect through the conclusion of the American Civil War. The Confederacy also operated under a Provisional Constitution from February 8, 1861 to March 11, 1861.
In regard to most articles of the Constitution, the document is a word-for-word duplicate of the United States Constitution. The original, hand-written document is currently located in the University of Georgia archives at Athens, Georgia. The major differences between the two constitutions was the Confederacy's greater emphasis on the rights of individual member states, and an explicit support of slavery.
<span>Wikisource has original text related to:Constitution of the Confederate States of America</span>Fort Sumter and the Beginning of the War
Several federal forts were seized and converted to Confederate strongholds. By the time of Lincoln's inauguration only two major forts had not been taken. On April 11, Confederate General P. G. T. Beauregard demanded that Union Major Robert Anderson surrender Fort Sumter in Charleston, South Carolina. Sumter had a strategic position on an island defending Charleston's harbor. The supplies of the besieged forts would only last a few weeks. The Union sent ships to resupply the fort, but they were held off by Confederate ships. Beauregard's troops surrounded the fort and opened fire. A tremendous cannon firefight remarkably claimed no casualties. By April 14, Anderson was forced to surrender the fort. The first casualties of the War occurred after the surrender: while the fort flag was being lowered, a Union cannon misfired.
The next day, President Lincoln declared that the US faced a rebellion. Lincoln called up state militias and requested volunteers to enlist in the Army. In response to this call and to the surrender of Fort Sumter, four more states seceded; Virginia, Arkansas, Tennessee, and North Carolina. The Civil War had begun.
Each side determined its strategies. The Confederate leadership felt that its army only needed to defend itself to gain independence. By its tactical strengths and its material shortages, it created what Jefferson Davis named an "offensive defensive" strategy. It would strengthen its defense posture, when conditions were right, by occasional offensive strikes into the North. However, three people who had important roles in Confederate plans had different strategies. While President Davis argued for a solely defensive war, General Robert E. Lee asserted they had to fight the Union head on, and General Thomas Jackson claimed they needed to invade the Union's important cities first and defeat the enemy to reclaim the cities.
The strategy of aging Union General Winfield Scott became popularly known as the Anaconda Plan. Named for the South American snake that strangles its victims to death, the plan aimed to defeat the Confederacy by surrounding it on all sides with a blockade of Southern ports and the swift capture of the Mississippi River.
