Du Hua, The Rise of Antislavery Politics in the Antebellum United States

What caused the American Civil War? What role did antislavery activists play in this process? These are questions that have been haunting the academia and the public ever since the bombardment of Fort Sumter on April 12, 1861. For scholars like Charles A. and Mary R. Beard who bought Senator William H. Seward (R-NY)'s talk of "an irrepressible conflict" and underlined the sectional differences between the North and South, antislavery activists stayed at the margins of the discussion. But for others, they loomed large in bringing about the American Civil War. Depending on scholars' stance, antislavery activists emerged as either fanatics and radicals who pushed the country into the abyss of the Civil War, or visionaries and heroes who brought about the slaves' emancipation. Clearly belonging to the latter camp, Du Hua's book sheds new light on this issue.