Book contents
- The Constitutional Origins of the American Civil War
- Cambridge Historical Studies in American Law and Society
- The Constitutional Origins of the American Civil War
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Figures
- Tables
- Preface
- Acknowledgments
- Abbreviations
- Terms
- 1 The Original Intent of the Slaveholding Founders
- 2 Two Constitutional Wrongs Did Not Guarantee a Constitutional Right
- 3 The Tyranny of the Northern Majority
- 4 The Spirit of 1787
- 5 The Constitutional Right of Secession
- Epilogue
- Charts Showing the Authors of Manuscript Sources Cited
- Charts Showing the South’s Minority Status in the Federal Government
- Select Bibliography
- Index
1 - The Original Intent of the Slaveholding Founders
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 June 2019
- The Constitutional Origins of the American Civil War
- Cambridge Historical Studies in American Law and Society
- The Constitutional Origins of the American Civil War
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Figures
- Tables
- Preface
- Acknowledgments
- Abbreviations
- Terms
- 1 The Original Intent of the Slaveholding Founders
- 2 Two Constitutional Wrongs Did Not Guarantee a Constitutional Right
- 3 The Tyranny of the Northern Majority
- 4 The Spirit of 1787
- 5 The Constitutional Right of Secession
- Epilogue
- Charts Showing the Authors of Manuscript Sources Cited
- Charts Showing the South’s Minority Status in the Federal Government
- Select Bibliography
- Index
Summary
Chapter 1 examines how ordinary antebellum Americans cherished the Constitution for enshrining their “free institutions” of freedom of speech, press, and religion as well as representative democracy and local self-government. Indeed, Americans boasted that the Constitution had given them a form of government that was superior to any other in the world. At the same time that they gloried in the Constitution, mid-nineteenth-century Americans were divided by the Constitution. Slavery, more than any other issue, drove the division. Except for a tiny group of radicals, antislavery Northerners believed the Constitution was either antislavery or at least neutral towards slave labor. Northern conservatives and some moderate Southerners held that the Constitution countenanced slavery and they accepted this as the price for a constitutional union of free states and slave states. Most white Southerners believed that the Constitution was avowedly proslavery. This three-way debate carried over to the lives and intentions of the Founders and the proper way to interpret their Constitution.Southerners believed that the Constitution was avowedly pro-slavery. This three-way debate carried over to the lives and intentions of the Founders and the proper way to interpret their Constitution.
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- The Constitutional Origins of the American Civil War , pp. lviii - 38Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2019