THE FESTERING CIVIL WAR IN THE UNITED STATES (1850-1861) FROM THE POINT OF THE ABOLITIONIST PRESS
The article covers the reaction of the abolitionist periodicals to the Central events of the social and political life of the United States in the pre-war decade, when there was a sharp aggravation of sectional contradictions between the northern and southern States. The desire of the South to strengthen its position in the Union by extending slavery to new territories met strong resistance from the public of the North. An active position in the ideological confrontation between the North and the South was occupied by abolitionists who advocated the abolition of slavery since the early 1830s. Appealing to the unpopular compromises in the North (1850, 1854), the Civil war in Kansas, the lost Dredd Scott’s case, and other significant events of the period, abolitionist newspapers began to exert increasing pressure on the slave-owning system. Special attention is paid to the efforts of the editors of anti-slavery newspapers to create an image of the enemy in the person of the South. Thus, they inflamed the passions and increased the confrontational moods in the North. In addition, lots of attention of the abolitionist periodicals was directed to the activities of the Republican Party. Many publications, which traditionally did not accept political methods of struggle, reacted to the Republicans with distrust and skepticism. The article traces the ambiguous position of abolitionists regarding the participation of the Republican Party in the presidential elections of 1856 and 1860 and their perception of the first Republican President in the United States Abraham Lincoln.