A New Understanding of Why We Fought the Civil War. Thoreau’s deification of John Brown should be a reminder of the perils of glorifying political violence in the name of any ideal. John Brown ...

It is said that John Brown was the spark that started the Civil War. Truly, he marked the end of compromise over the issue of slavery, and it was not long after his death that John Brown's war ...

And Brown may not have ended the war on slavery, but some say he had a pretty big role in starting the war. “Walt Whitman called John Brown the mediator of the war,” Baldau said.