Myth: The American Civil War was all about slavery.

Fact: Although slavery was a major disagreement between the North and the South and the primary reason the Southern states began seceding from the union, if you were to ask the individual soldier doing the fighting, most of them would give you a different reason. The soldiers in the south would say they were primarily fighting for their independence. Most of them were too poor to own slaves and many resented the fact that they were forced to fight when the big slave owners were exempt from the draft. The soldiers in the North would say they were fighting primarily to preserve the Union. Many of them would never have risked their lives over the issue of slavery. Even Lincoln himself at one point said “If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that.”