Reference no: EM133245884

Introduction: Surveys of American history often gloss over this topic. I'm sure you've heard the story of the end of American slavery told something like this: "The North was anti-slavery, and so the Civil War decided the issue. Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863 and freed all of the slaves." I've heard this over and over as a history teacher, and I feel like part of my job is to clarify this gross oversimplification. I think that one of the more fascinating ways to "do this" is to examine how Northerners saw slavery in the Antebellum period. Northern textile mills thrived off of the cheap cotton that the South supplied; indeed, the Northern economy boomed on human bondage. Roark, et. al., state that "mob violence erupted in northern cities with regularity when abolitionist speakers came to town."   Indeed, abolitionists were seen as dangerous radicals. To give an example from the Civil War, when President Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation, many Union regiments threatened to desert the army because they were not fighting the war for the purposes of slave liberation. Northerners, like most people in the 19^th Century, were fairly racist. What follows is an exploration of prominent ideas regarding slavery in the Antebellum Period.

Question for this discussion: Why did Northerners largely ignore the issue of slavery in the Antebellum period? How did the publication of Uncle Tom's Cabin help to change that perception?