The Causes Of The War Of 1812

Essay, Research Paper

The War of 1812 was not merely a battle against an external foe but stemmed from internal problems as well. The external enemy that the United States was facing was Britain, but that was not the most severe dilemma that they faced. The real problem that was occurring during this time was the internal struggle going on in the United States of America. These internal conflicts consisted of matters such as the issue of the north part of the country which was federalist did not want to go into war, but the south part of the states, which were anti-federalist wanted to go into war. Another issue was the war hawks, a group of western and southern leaders that was firmly republican in their party’s loyalty and encouraged war, the war hawks would become a cause for more internal problems facing the United States during the time period around the War of 1812. One issue that supports the statement that internal struggle was a factor that led to the War of 1812 is the issue of the dispute between the northern part of the United States, which, being mostly federalist, was loyal to the British, not wanting to go to war and the southern part of the United States, having enough of the British presence on U.S. soil, wanting to go to war. This dispute was over whether or not to go to war; anger and rage flew back and forth during the heated debates about facing Britain in a battle or just backing off. The north wanted to back off and did not want war, while the south craved to get Britain out of the U.S and teach them a lesson. This caused great conflict in Congress and the government as a whole. This conflict grew in size and was one of the major reasons that the U.S. decided to go to war with Britain, without the influence spurred by this conflict, war may have never occurred. The last issue that caused U.S. internal conflict was the presence of the war hawks, a group of southern and western leaders that encouraged war against Britain due to the fact that they were fed up with their occupation of U.S. land and the fact that they believed that Canada should be in the possession on themselves, the war hawks. This issue caused great turbulence among the political parties and government of the U.S. It brought forth issues that once were never thought were able to come up and were thought to be avoidable. This came to become an aspect and contribution towards the choice to stand up and fight the war with Britain instead of backing down, which led to the start of the War of 1812. Hence, the War of 1812 was not merely a war fought against an external foe but stemmed from internal problem as well. These internal issues and conflicts ranged from turbulence between the North and South and the war hawk conflict. Conflicts like these lead to war and in this case, it led to the War of 1812 between the United States and Britain. Therefore, the internal affairs spurred conflict that became the basis of the War of 1812