The Battle of Fort SumterThe Beginning: Succession“The secession of the Southern states, individually or as a whole, was the sure consequence of Mr. Lincoln's election. His rise to supreme and almost unparalleled power was an unmistakable declaration on the part of the New England merchants that they had determined to exclude the Southern landowners from all participation in the legislation of their common country. (Boyd). Outrage in the South reached a fever pitch with John Brown's conspiracy to command a slave rebellion in Harper's Ferry, Virginia in 1859. Similarly, Northern states were shocked by the Supreme Court case Dred Scott v. Sanford who declared deemed unconstitutional land. In 1860, no one could ignore the issue of slavery and state's rights during presidential elections. The Democratic Party fought along regional lines for control of the direction to take to address slavery in the West. Meanwhile, the Republican Party nominated a young man who advocated making all new states slave-free. His name was Abraham Lincoln. "We must not disturb slavery in the states where it exists, because the Constitution and the peace of the country forbid us to do so. We must not deny an effective fugitive slave law, because the Constitution requires it. But we must, by national policy, prevent the spread of slavery into new territories, or free states, because the constitution does not forbid us, and the general welfare requires such prevention (Lincoln) Mr. Lincoln's views were so polarizing that he ended up with less than forty percent of the vote popular. However, due to the lack of unity in the Democratic Party, it still managed to triumph and successfully… at the center; of paper… it comes within two or three generations." Nearly five generations have passed since the first shots were fired at Fort Sumter, and their repercussions are still being felt. (Jenkins).Works Citedhttp://docsouth.unc.edu/fpn/boydl/boydl.html, University of South Carolina “Belle Boyd” Library, May 28, 2014. https://www.loc.gov/ teachers/ schoolmaterials.com “ Lincoln's 1860 Presidential Campaign “, Library of Congress 2014 https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/fortsumter “Fort Sumter: The Civil War Begins “April, 2011 The Longest Night: A History of the Civil War, Eicher, David J., New York: Simon And Schuster, 2001 PrintThe Crisis of the American Republic: A History of the Civil War Era, Guelzo, Allen; New York: St. Martin's Press, 1995 PrintThe Civil War: A Visual History, Jenkins, Mark Collins; DK Publishing, March 21, 2011 Print