Wars have been fought for many different reasons through the years, and that holds true for the American Civil War (1861-1865). In Michael Shaara’s Pulitzer Prize winning novel, The Killer Angels, the reasons for fighting the war are brought about through the officers and soldiers at a famous battle site of the Civil War, Gettysburg. Gettysburg was one of the most documented battles of the whole war. It took place over a span of three days and can be viewed as a turning point from Confederate prominence to Confederate demise. The Union and the Confederacy each had their own views as to why they were fighting the war. The propaganda pitch the Union gave was they were fighting to free the slaves. This was not true! It was said Southerners were fighting to preserve slavery. This is also a false statement. In fact, there were a substantial amount of generals in the Union army that owned slaves themselves. In addition the constitution protected slavery. If the true issue was to maintain slavery the South would not have seceded. There are many quotes from northern leaders that show clearly that the main purpose of the North was not the eradication of slavery, but subjugation of the southern people. Slavery was used to rally the northern population behind Abraham Lincoln’s war. It was an emotional issue, sure some Yankees joined and fought to “set men free”, but most were there to preserve the union. An interesting conflict of northern morals is discovered. The North is portrayed as wanting to set black men free, but they practiced economic slavery on the Southern states. The Civil War was really more politically complex with regards to Abraham Lincoln and his Republican Party’s actions. The South fought this war as the Second American Revolution. The Northern states' politicians were aggressively attempting to implement a monarchial form of government, which was precisely what the early colonists had fought...
