Hey everyone, northerner here in the Deep South. I've been taught my whole life that the civil war was mainly about slavery. However, obviously people here have a different opinion.
I know the war was too complex to narrow it down to one issue, but I'm fairly certain slavery was the driving cause. Does anyone have any academic resources to back that up? Or any input is appreciated. Thanks
This calls for some primary sources!
The Cornerstone Speech given by Confederate Vice President Alexander Stephens in March of 1861. It's fairly lengthy, so I'll quote here the most relevant part to the topic at hand:
The prevailing ideas entertained by [Thomas Jefferson] and most of the leading statesmen at the time of the formation of the old constitution, were that the enslavement of the African was in violation of the laws of nature; that it was wrong in principle, socially, morally, and politically...Those ideas, however, were fundamentally wrong. They rested upon the assumption of the equality of races. This was an error...Our new government is founded upon exactly the opposite idea; its foundations are laid, its corner- stone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery subordination to the superior race is his natural and normal condition. This, our new government, is the first, in the history of the world, based upon this great physical, philosophical, and moral truth.
This link provides some recent discussion on this subreddit:
The fact that many Southern States pretty clearly state in their secession statements that protection of slavery is their main reason for secession is illuminating as to the true cause of secession (See various quotes from seceding State's secession documents in the comments linked above).
Of course the immediate cause of the war was to prevent (or reverse) secession. (Lincoln's belief was that the parts of a democratic republic could not be allowed to secede just because they did not like the views of a Constitutional majority (in this case, they did not like Lincoln being elected on a platform which proposed to limit the expansion of slavery into new territories - this limitation was just in the platform, it had not even been proposed nor voted on yet).
Lincoln thought that "Government of the people, by the people, for the people", would perish from this earth, if every little minority that disagreed with a constitutional democratic decision (or, in this case, intention) could just opt out of the government and the nation. Either anarchy would ensue, or a dictatorship would take over.
So, the proximate cause of the war was secession, but the cause of secession was the desire to defend the institution of slavery.
You can read many more comments if you search the FAQ of this sub reddit.
For relatively academic resources, I'd think that any survey of the era written in the last few decades and put out by a reputable publisher would make the case pretty conclusively. McPherson's Battle Cry of Freedom does it in about two chapters. Guelzo's Fateful Lightning does so even more concisely.
Those are both war-oriented surveys, McPherson somewhat more than Guelzo. For deeper looks at the issue, I think the standard text is still David Potter's The Impending Crisis, but John Ashworth's The Republic in Crisis, 1848-1860 makes the same case with more attention to ideology and a more modern sensibility. If you want to go really into detail, and don't mind some really dated content, volumes of Alan Nevins' Ordeal of the Union also serve well to make the point. At times they're almost a walking tour of the 1850s. For the specific intersection of states' rights and slavery, and a convincing case that southern fondness for states' rights flowed from slavery even in its ideological heartland, Manisha Sinha's The Counterrevolution of Slavery, Politics and Ideology in South Carolina does an excellent job. (Ashworth also touches on this, but more generally since he's doing late antebellum survey.) William W Freehling's Road to Disunion volumes, Secessionists at Bay and Seccessionists Triumphant reach all the way back to 1776 and do a very good job of placing slavery at the heart of the conflict.
For the more immediate history, one can't do better than what the secessionists themselves said, as quoted elsewhere. Worthwhile here is Charles Dew's Apostles of Disunion, which covers not just what the Confederates-on-the-make said to the general public but also the cases they made to fellow slave states via appointed commissioners. Dew's forward could be summarized as "I grew up believing it was states' rights. I know otherwise now and here are some of the many reasons why." The documents that Dew relies on are mostly less-known, but equally convincing.
I have heard good things about Elizabeth Varon's Disunion, but haven't yet read it myself.