I Can’t Do It
June 13, 2008
I had to write another paper for my History of Virginia class today. This time it was about the factors that led to the split between West Virginia and Virginia. I tried to keep it within the 500 word limit but I just couldn’t. Last time, the teacher marked things off for not having “complete thoughts”. I would rather get points taken off for going over an arbitrary limit by 69 words then by being incomplete. Anyway, here is the paper:
The Schism Between Eastern and Western Virginia
Prior to the Civil War, Virginia and West Virginia were one united state. This belies the fact that while they might have been unified geographically, they were anything but similar. These differences in cultural background (ethnic and religious), economic basis, and political ideologies made the split inevitable and the conflict over slavery was the driving imperative.
Settlement of the western portions of Virginia was achieved differently then the piedmont and tidewater areas. The older settled areas had been populated by immigrants primarily from England who had established the Anglican (later Episcopalian) church as the dominant sect of Christianity in the area while moving westward. In contrast to this, settlers in the west were of primarily German or Scotch-Irish heritage. These peoples came from other colonies further north such as Pennsylvania. They also shared different religious beliefs then the eastern colonists. The prevalence of Methodists, Presbyterians, and Lutherans and the common background made them associate more with their northern, pro-abolition neighbors[1]. This would be especially obvious as the debate over slavery gained momentum in the mid-19th century.
There were also economic differences between the western and eastern portion of the state. Eastern Virginia has historically been associated with the cash crop economy; first tobacco then cotton. These needed large amounts of labor to be profitable and as time went on this meant higher and higher numbers of slaves. This was not the case in the west where the standard was a smaller farm without slaves. The west also profited more from industries such as mining and early railroads. These tied the region more with northern industry as a source of economic prosperity through trade[2]. The plantation system brought a level of prosperity to the state that never made it into the northwest. While easterners got rich, the average income of western Virginians dropped over the same period[3]. These differences in economy created an unbalance in slave populations in the area. At the outbreak of the Civil War, slaves comprised only 3% of the population in the northwest as opposed to 49% and 43% in the piedmont and tidewater regions respectively[4].
Economic and social differences between these two regions of the state often manifested themselves with political conflict. Westerners often saw themselves as the victims of unfair representation within the state. Prior to the Virginia Constitution of 1851, voting laws favored landed eastern Virginian while the poorer west suffered because of the population boosted given by slaves. Taxes were also levied in ways that many saw as politically biased. Slaves were only partially taxed while land and livestock were taxed fully. One example occurred in 1860 when wool was taxed in order to pay for a military mobilization. Many saw this as unfair since eastern goods like corn and tobacco were not taxed while western wool was[5].
All of these difference between east and west where magnified by the argument over slavery. Many westerners shared the same evangelical background as northern abolitionists which fostered more anti-slavery sentiments. There was also less of a basis in the region for slavery given the lack of economic necessity and the legislative favoritism shown to eastern slave-holders compounded the problems. The history of west and eastern Virginia relations is one of bias and injustice stemming from the issue of slavery. That the west split away was an inevitable result of the slave system.
[1] Peter Wallenstein, Cradle of America: Four Centuries of Virginia History (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2007), 151.
[2] William A. Link, Roots of Secession: Slavery and Politics in Antebellum Virginia (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2003), 9.
[3] Ibid., 32.
[4] Ibid., 39.
[5] Ibid., 205.
