Failure of limited war Flashcards
Topic sentence
Some historians such as Lauren Fowlds argue that the failure of limited war was the most significant reason in forcing Lincoln to issue the Emancipation Proclamation.
Background
When Civil war broke out in April 1861, Lincoln was determined to maintain a ‘limited war’, meaning that there were restrictions on the weapons used, nations or territories involved and objects used. Lincoln’s administration were under the impression that the war would be a short 90 day conflict, however, as time passed both the Union and the Confederacy came to the realisation that their images of how the war would play out were distorted, the war would not be a short conflict and would forever remain if the issue of slavery was never addressed.
Evidence - battles
Events such as the Seven Day Battle, June 25th to July 1st 1862 convinced Lincoln that he was going to have to switch up his war aims. The Seven Day Battle was a series of battles near Richmond, Virginia when Confederate Gerneral Robert E Lee forced General George McClellans troops to retreat, ending the Penisula campaign ( an Union attempt to capture the Confederate Capital, Richmond from the South East). This ( and other) Confederate victories shocked Lincoln as he believed that the war would be an easy Northern victory due to the military advantages that they held over the Confederacy.
For example, the Union army consisted of nearly 7 million white makes, compared to only 2 million in the Southern army and the North had a much larger industrial capacity than the south. Historian Lauren Fowlds argues, “they (the union) had a great advantage, however, compared to the confederacy who had to start their military organisation from scratch”. As a result of this, Lincoln began to consider introduction the emancipation of slaves as a union war aim, with the intention of weakening the confederate war effort as their economy was fully revolved around slavery.
Counter analysis
However, up until 1862, Lincoln expressed his views on the slavery issue, saying “My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and it is not either to save or destroy slavery”, suggesting that he did not see a slavery as a vital war issue to be addressed.
Evaluation
To evaluate, the failure of a limited war was an important factor in forcing Lincoln to pass the Emancipation Proclamation as the strength of the Confederacy’s war effort concerned Lincoln and encouraged him to switch up his war aims, introducing the destruction of slavery. Historian Susan Mary Grant argues that the war could not be fought and won without factoring in the issue of slavery, and this was making it hard to maintain a limited policy.
