The Civil War in the United States

Readers will not find a Marxist interpretation of the American Civil War laid out in this volume. Rather, they will observe Marx and Engels working to define their own approach to history and politics while analyzing the American Civil War as it developed into the greatest social revolution that the United States has so far achieved.

Radicals and revolutionaries found themselves in a complex political position at the outbreak of the American Civil War of 1861-65. They demanded a war against...