All 5 million of them, eh?
You let 4 minority states tell you what to think, and *IGNORE* what the other 7 had to say. Why do you do this? Because you want to believe what you want to believe, and you aren't interested in anything that doesn't support what you wish to believe.
Virginia seceded because they viewed the Federal government attempting to raise an army to subjugate their sister states as Tyranny. Virginia was the most important state in the Confederacy, yet you ignore what the most important state had to say to focus on what bugtussel Mississippi had to say.
Not very objective, that.
“sister states”
That isn’t the phrase that Virginia used. What phrase did they use?
‘not only to the injury of the people of Virginia, but to the oppression of the Southern “slaveholding” States.’
Oh look, there’s the S word.