Chapter 1 A NATION ON THE EDGE In 1860 the United States had been a nation for less than one hundred years During the 1770s the thirteen British colonies had joined together to form a new nation made up of separate states By 1860 that nation had grown to thirty-three states However it was not easy to get all those states to work together as one United States Each state had its own laws and way of doing things The federal or national government also had laws Sometimes the state and federal laws did not agree Different laws about slavery would cause the biggest problem the United States would ever face 4
Slavery had existed in the United States since colonial days But the northern states had gotten rid of slavery while the states in the South had not Southern states needed slaves to work on their plantations and allow them to produce goods such as cotton The southern states also did not want other states to tell them what to do As far as the South was concerned they had every right to keep slaves Southern plantation owners relied on slaves to work on their huge plantations The southern economy could not work without slaves 5
By 1860 the issue of slavery was tearing the United States apart That year Abraham Lincoln was elected president of the United States Lincoln was against slavery The southern states did not want Lincoln to change their way of life So eleven of the southern states decided they did not want to be part of the United States anymore They seceded or left and formed their own nation called the Confederate States of America That action began a long struggle called the Civil War When the Civil War began Fort Sumter was an unfinished building in the harbor of Charleston South Carolina Over the next three years this fort would become one of the most important symbols of the Civil War Abraham Lincoln 1809 1865 The Confederate flag is also known as the Stars and Bars because of its design 6
Fort Sumter Robert Barnwell Rhett In 1860 Robert Barnwell Rhett wrote in the Charleston Mercury newspaper There exists a great mistake in supposing that the people of the United States are or ever have been one people On the contrary never did the sun shine on two peoples as thoroughly distinct as the people of the North and South Robert Barnwell Rhett 1800 1876 7
