The Differences Slavery Made: A Close Analysis of Two American Communities
William E. Gienapp, "The Crisis of American Democracy: The Political System and the Coming of the American Civil War," Why the Civil War Came (New York: Oxford University Press, 1996): 81-124.

SYNOPSIS:

Gienapp points to elements in the U.S. Constitution that created opportunities to destabilize the American political system. The lack of clarity on the right of secession, the size of states, the creation of the electoral college, the four-year term for the President, and the voting practices of antebellum states combined in a way that produced a political realignment in the 1850s and helped make possible a civil war in the 1860s.

EXCERPT:

"The American political system was particularly vulnerable to sectional strains and tensions. One reason was the institutional structure of American politics. The Civil War occurred within a particular political institutional framework that, while it did not make the war inevitable, was essential to the coming of the war." (84)

"There was nothing inevitable, however, about the rise of the Republican party. Another set of events in the 1850s might have led to a different outcome, and thus the historian must analyze these developments from the perspective of the time, with due allowance for chance and contingency, rather than reasoning backward from the war's beginning in 1861. The Republican party's growing strength did not foreclose the possibility of avoiding war, but it significantly narrowed the range of options and limited the ability of political moderates to defuse the slavery issue in national politics." (95)

"That the Republican party was not allowed to contest elections in the South also had important consequences. Popular hostility prevented Republicans from campaigning or running candidates outside the border slave states--a situation that increased misperceptions on both sides." (120)

"Politicians and editors rallied popular support by indulging in sectional stereotypes and sectional boasting. They also misinterpreted the aims of their opponents. But while politicians capitalized on and inflamed popular fears in both sections, these fears were not artificially created nor can they be dismissed as mass paranoia. There was a Slave Power which did wield unusual power in American life, and the Republican party did threaten southern interests and the long-term future of slavery." (121)

RELATIONSHIP:

Gienapp argues that the causes of the sectional conflict begin with "the existence of slavery." (82) Gienapp also argues that just as slavery became an political issue because politicians "injected" it into the political system, it also fueled a "crystallization of rival sectional ideologies oriented toward protecting white equality and opportunity." (83) Our work focuses intensely on that process of crystallization, which can only be understood through its constituent elements of social, economic, and political structures in local communities, all in interaction.

Points of Analysis to this Historiography:

"In Augusta clusters of contiguous precincts gave their support in the 1860 presidential election in similar patterns."

"Whigs accounted for the most visible party activists in Augusta County, but activists in both parties exerted significant influence."

"Precincts in Augusta that supported Breckinridge at a high level in 1860 represented the extremes of wealth, as the wealthiest and the poorest precincts drew more support for Breckinridge than any other precincts."

"The precincts with high Bell support had average household wealth and farm value well below county averages. For these marginal places a vote for Bell represented a safe course, the least change."

"In Franklin County, John Breckinridge won a majority in six precincts, most of them in the far northern and western belt of the county, where few blacks lived and farmers planted corn not wheat."

"Lincoln won sixteen precincts in Franklin, ten of them by margins greater than 55 percent, with support mainly from the urban center of the county and places with the highest numbers of black residents--even though black men could not vote in Pennsylvania."


Citation: Key = H026
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