against in the American Revolution. The Northern states were taking advantage of their superior numbers in the federal government and were using their advantage to implement unfair tariffs against the South. Enormous amounts of money were taken from the South and funneled into the northern states. Most of the revenue taken from the Southern states was used to run government programs. This brought about the argument of “State’s Rights” and a weaker central government by the South. The main cause of the war was Lincoln’s rejection of the right to peaceable secession of the eleven sovereign states and subsequently the denial of self-government to the nearly 8 million people living in those states. The Federal government needed the income from the South so they were forced into fighting to save the tax coming from the South. Without consulting Congress, Lincoln sent great armies of destruction to the South. The Southern people had no choice but to defend themselves from this invasion. The South fought, simply, for their independence, as the United States federal government of the northern states refused to allow the South to leave peacefully. The men of the South did not fight to win their freedom; they fought to keep it! For all intents and purposes, if the North had not invaded the South, there would have been no war. The name "civil war" implies that two, or more, groups of people within a country take up arms against each other in a struggle for the government. This was not what took place in the South between 1861 and 1865. It was an invasion of one nation into another independent, sovereign nation. The struggle is properly called "The War For Southern Independence," as that is the most correct description of the reasoning behind the war. The Southern soldier fought to protect his home, State, and Nation from the invading United States army. He fought in honor of his forefathers who had fought against Britis...
