Constitution
The Constitution became a weapon for sectional discord and tension in the years preceding the Civil War. When it was framed the Constitution was deliberately unclear on the subject of slavery, even though men like Thomas Jefferson were for outlawing the institution and others, southerners for the most part, were all for codifying it. Instead, their means compromise to ignore the issue proved to be a curse to posterity since the indecision and confusion of the nation on the slavery issue was thus embedded in the cornerstone of its government. Because the Constitution speaks of property and state’s rights as well as the equality of men without any specific clarification of the relationship of these principles to slavery, it was used to support both sides of the debate. Because of this ambiguity on the matters of states’ rights, of property rights and of the very definition of ‘all men’ it buckled when confronted with the question of slavery, and the nation buckled with it. The identity of a state in relation to the nation is never properly defined in the Constitution, and this was a source of much conflict. From the beginning under the Articles of Confederation, the individual states were protective of their powers and onl
Some topics in this essay:
President Buchanan’s, Thomas Jefferson, Constitution United, Lloyd Garrison, Articles Confederation, Georgian’ Document, Abraham Lincoln, Jefferson Davis, James Buchanan, Waldo Emerson, national government, views slaves, property rights, slavery issue, national policy,
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Approximate Word count = 943
Approximate Pages = 4 (250 words per page double spaced)
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