“Fort Sumter attack was NOT a good idea.”
The Fort Sumter incident was “blamed” as the cause for war, but in fact Lincoln was planning to militarily “bring back” the seceded states regardless. Lincoln would have initiated military action even if Sumter had not been bombarded. Lincoln wanted the Southern revenues above all else.
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Firing on a Federal Fort, manned by Federal soldiers and issuing letters of Marque, authorizing piracy against ships flying the flag of the United States, rises above the level of an incident. These are conscientious acts of war. What Lincoln may have been planning is immaterial. Jefferson Davis made the decision to go to war against the United States.
Him and what army?
The country wouldn't have backed him if he tried to start a war after saying he wouldn't.
At the time, the only such plan Lincoln had was General Scott's "Anaconda Plan", which had first been developed to deal with Southern rebellion under President Pierce's Secretary of War, a gentleman named... yes, Jefferson Davis.
Regardless, on February 18, 1861 that same Jefferson Davis promised he would make war if the "integrity" of the Confederacy was "assailed".
On March 4, Abraham Lincoln promised he would not "assail" and so the Confederacy could not have a war unless they themselves started it.
On April 12, Jefferson Davis decided that Abraham Lincoln's resupply mission to Union troops in Union Fort Sumter "assailed" Confederate "integrity" and so Davis assaulted Fort Sumter, the assault Lincoln took as an Act of War against the United States.
The fact is the Confederacy could have avoided war over Fort Sumter in the same manner US Founders avoided war over many British forts in US states & territories after 1783: by not impulsively attacking those forts and instead relying on patient, decades long diplomacy to resolve them.
ought-six: "Lincoln would have initiated military action even if Sumter had not been bombarded.
Lincoln wanted the Southern revenues above all else."
Total revisionist nonsense.
In fact, even before Lincoln's inauguration, the Confederacy called up 100,000 troops to oppose the US Army of barely 16,000 with most of those scattered in small forts out west.
So Lincoln had neither ability nor intention to start military actions.
Like previous President Buchanan, all Lincoln wanted before Fort Sumter (April 12) was to hold & resupply those few remaining Federal assets in the Confederacy.
Of course, many Confederates chose to view both Buchanan's and Lincoln's resupply missions as "assailing" Confederate "integrity" and so Davis responded at Fort Sumter as he had promised on February 18.
With that assault, Davis met Lincoln's criteria for starting war, and so, as he promised on March 4, "the war came".
As for those Federal revenues which so excite pro-Confederate revisionists, careful study shows that Federal revenues did indeed fall a little in 1861, but that it had no effect on government operations and after Congress adjusted taxes, revenues grew hugely throughout the Civil War.
So revenues were not the great factor revisionists propose.
What really mattered to Lincoln was his Oath of Office, and the Confederacy's war, provoked, started, declared & waged against the United States.