Well it was when the United States was formed. I thought their victory over the British established that the right of states to be independent was valid.
If it was valid in 1776, why wouldn't it be valid "four score and seven years" later?
It’s a question of whether of a government has ceased to represent its people.
It is exactly that. As the Declaration of Independence says:
That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.
In 1860, many states believed the government of the United States no longer served their interests, and so they chose to exercise the right to independence which the founders established.
Had the slaves revolted and killed every God-damned slave-holder (I mean that 100% literally, not as a cuss) and blinded sheeple who fought on the side of the slave-holders, THAT would have been just.
Well let's not leave out all the Northern ship builders and shipping companies that rounded them up and brought them here. Obviously they were the lynchpin of the entire slave trade, and they were certainly more responsible for kidnapping them away from their homes than were the slaveholders who put them to work.
Much of the wealth of Boston and other parts of the Northeast are built on the slave trade. The US only accounted for 3% of the total slave trade across the Atlantic, so the northern slave ship companies were responsible for a lot more slavery than that which existed just in this country. I'd say they have a lot more to atone for than those who put that 3% to work. They also carried the other 97% into slavery.
While we are talking about punishing evil and revenge, we need to make sure all the appropriate parties get their fair share of the murder, er, I mean "Justice."