Vermont in the American Civil War Vermont in the American Civil War During the American Civil War, the State of Vermont continued the military tradition started by the Green Mountain Boys of American Revolutionary War fame, contributing a significant portion of its eligible men to the war effort. The second article in Vermont's constitution, originally written in 1777, abolished slavery, making it the first state to do so. Although its climate was not conducive to the slave trade, Vermonters were early participants in the abolitionist movement. In the 1860 presidential election, Vermont gave Republican Abraham Lincoln a lopsided victory, 33,808 votes compared to 8,649 for Stephen
Origins of the American Civil War Rise and Fall of the Slave Power in America" (1872–1877) is the foremost representative of this moral interpretation, which argued that Northerners had fought to preserve the union against the aggressive designs of "slave power". Later, in his seven-volume "History of the United States from the Compromise of 1850 to the Civil War", (1893–1900), James Ford Rhodes identified slavery as the central—and virtually only—cause of the Civil War. The North and South had reached positions on the issue of slavery that were both irreconcilable and unalterable. The conflict had become inevitable. But the idea that the war was avoidable became