Causes and Effects of the Civil War

Did you know that in the Civil War, America lost the most men ever? After four years and over 600,000 American lives, the Union (North) prevailed in wearing down and forcing the Confederacy (South) to surrender. Eli Whitney's cotton gin, the Missouri Compromise, and the Dred Scott case contributed greatly to the Civil War. After the Civil War, the Southern economy was devastated with millions of homeless, while the northern economy boomed.

Eli Whitney created one of the first causes of the Civil. In 1793 Eli Whitney's invention of the cotton gin greatly increased the amount of cotton produced. The cotton gin cleaned the cotton by extracting the cottonseeds efficiently. In the 1800's, 36,000 bales of cotton were exported, but after the invention of the cotton gin, 4,600,000 bales of cotton were produced. This could not be done with out the help of slave labor. Slave labor allowed the production of cotton to be profitable and the southern farms relied on slaves because they couldn't plant and harvest more cotton without them. The southern economy grew dependent on slave labor and some areas of the south consisted of over 50% slaves.

As the tensions grew, the battle for free or slave states intensified. The Missouri Comprise decided whether Missouri would be admitted into the union as a state that would allow or prohibit slavery. This issue is due to the fact that Missouri doesn't lie on either side of the Ohio River. As of 1819 any states south of the Ohio River was admitted as a slave state and any states north of the Ohio River were admitted as a free state. Southerners believes that if the United States could forbid slavery in Missouri, they could do so elsewhere. It 1820 congress finally agreed that slavery would be allowed in Missouri, but at the same time Maine would be carved out and admitted to the union as a free state. They also agreed that as the United States Expanded westward, states north of the 36 and a half degrees North would be free states, while states south of that would be slave states. This angered the north because under the compromise the new slave states covered more land than that of the new free states. Northerners worried that another slave state might increase the power of the southern states in the government.

One of the final cause of the Civil was involved a slave named Dred Scott. Dred Scott was an enslaved person owned by John Emerson. Emerson took Dred Scott from Missouri to Illinois, a free state. They then moved back to Missouri, which was a slave state under the Missouri Compromise. In 1857 Dred Scott sued the state of Missouri on the claim that by living in a free state, he was free and had earned his freedom. Scott won that case, but the ruling was later overturn by the Missouri Supreme Court. The Missouri Supreme Court ruled that the compromises