- Joined
- Mar 31, 2012
- Location
- Central Ohio
... Which you've no doubt been waiting for with baited breath. Haven't you?
Well, maybe not, but I'll inflict it on you anyway.
The sequence of events leading up to the war clearly shows a pattern of Southern aggressiveness, completely giving the lie to all claims of passivity and pacifism. Out-of-the-ordinary, aggressive actions are bolded and colored red for Southern-initiated actions and blue for Northern. Ordinary business is not bolded.
Lincoln's call for volunteers and the blockade is in fact the first principal aggressive move by the Federal government, and is clearly in response to Southern/Confederate provocation. So much for all "Lincoln engineered the war" nonsense.
Well, maybe not, but I'll inflict it on you anyway.
The sequence of events leading up to the war clearly shows a pattern of Southern aggressiveness, completely giving the lie to all claims of passivity and pacifism. Out-of-the-ordinary, aggressive actions are bolded and colored red for Southern-initiated actions and blue for Northern. Ordinary business is not bolded.
- The Republican Party Convention, unable to settle on earlier favorites like William H. Seward and Salmon P. Chase, results in the nomination of dark-horse candidate Abraham Lincoln.
- The Democratic Party splits into factions roughly paralleling the approaching North-South split, and two separate conventions nominate different slates of candidates.
- Lincoln is elected by a plurality in the national presidential election.
- South Carolina, fearing that Lincoln's election will lead to the abolition of slavery, announces its secession. Other states of the lower South call for conventions and votes to consider following suit.
- President Buchanan adopts a policy of retaining possession of Federal property in the seceding states.
- Under advisement from his cabinet, Buchanan decides that an attempt to resupply Fort Sumter will be made by an unarmed steamer, the "Star of the West," rather than by a Navy warship, in an attempt to be minimally provocative.
- The "Star of the West" is fired on and damaged when approaching Charleston Harbor with supplies for Fort Sumter. She turns back.
- More states of the lower South announce their secession.
- The Pensacola Navy Yard and other Federal installations in the lower South are seized by state troops. Forts Pickens and Sumter hold out.
- The Confederacy is established in Montgomery, Alabama.
- Lincoln is inaugurated and vows to continue Buchanan's policy of holding Federal installations.
- The seceding states mount military actions against Federal possessions within their borders, culminating in the firing on Fort Sumter.
- Lincoln calls for 75,000 volunteers to put down the rebellion and restore order in the insurrectionary states. He also calls for a naval blockade of the South.
- Virginia secedes, prompted by Lincoln's call for volunteers.
Lincoln's call for volunteers and the blockade is in fact the first principal aggressive move by the Federal government, and is clearly in response to Southern/Confederate provocation. So much for all "Lincoln engineered the war" nonsense.
Bringing the