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Oh, but they did, in Deep South states like South Carolina and Mississippi, which were #1 and #2 to secede, and they clearly said in their Reasons for Secession documents that protecting slavery was not just their biggest reason, but their only real reason.
In those two states nearly 50% of families owned slaves meaning that virtually everybody was close family & friends to slave-holders and therefore very concerned about their interests.

Oh but they didn’t. South Carolina attached the Address of Robert Barnwell Rhett to their declaration of causes which went on at length about the grossly unequal tariffs and federal government expenditures even though this was not unconstitutional and refusal to enforce the fugitive slave clause of the US Constitution was unconstitutional and provided the basis for saying the Northern states had violated the compact.

According to the 1860 US Census, South Carolina had 26,701 slave owners out of a total free population of 301,302 or 8.86% of all free people owned slaves. Mississippi had 30,943 slave owners out of a total free population of 354,674 or 8.72% of all free people owned slaves.

Claims that they were being somehow “bilked” are simply false, and hard to argue when Deep South planters and their white neighbors were then, on average, the most prosperous people ever on Earth.

Nope. Your denial is simply false. Yes the South was indeed prosperous. That’s not surprising given that it was the #1 supplier of Cotton which was a hugely important commodity in the early to mid 19th century. It was also a major supplier of Tobacco, Indigo, Rice, Sugar, and other valuable commodities. It would have been far more wealthy had it not been economically exploited by the Northern states to pay for their industrialization.

Possibly, in some cases, but remember the Compromise of 1850 made the Federal government, not Northern states, responsible for enforcing Fugitive Slave laws.
Furthermore, the deeper South you traveled, the less of a “problem” were fugitive slaves, such that those who seemed to complain most about it had virtually zero “problem” with it.

Various Northern states enacted various laws to prevent compliance with federal agents attempt’s to recapture escaped slaves. You are right that it was less of a real problem for the states in the Deep South. It was more a means of saying that the Northern states had broken the deal (which they did). Their real grievance was not over escaped slaves, it was over tariffs that were very harmful to their economic interests and unequal federal government expenditures favoring Northern states with the money from tariffs paid overwhelmingly by Southerners. But no matter how much they hated that, it was not unconstitutional. Refusal to enforce the fugitive slave clause was.

Utterly false, a lie from the time first uttered and not made any more true with its constant repetition.

Nope. A lie on your part to deny it.

In fact, our Founders recognized only true necessity (as in 1776) and mutual consent (as in 1788) as legitimate reasons for disunion.
Neither condition existed in late 1860 & early 1861.
No Founder ever supported unilateral unapproved declaration of secession at pleasure, meaning in the absence of absolute necessity.

And yet that’s just what Confederates began to do in late 1860.

It is for each state to determine necessity and not for anybody else. Also it is completely false to say no Founder ever supported unilateral secession. I have provided numerous quotes showing this to be false already.

FLT-bird: "South Carolina attached the Address of Robert Barnwell Rhett to their declaration of causes which went on at length about the grossly unequal tariffs and federal government expenditures even though this was not unconstitutional and refusal to enforce the fugitive slave clause of the US Constitution was unconstitutional and provided the basis for saying the Northern states had violated the compact."

As discussed previously, if we include Rhett's address as the fifth original "Reasons for secession" document (along with SC, MS, GA & TX), it is the only one which focuses serious attention on reasons other than slavery.
But even in Rhett's address, slavery is discussed twice as much as the other alleged reasons combined.

FLT-bird: "According to the 1860 US Census, South Carolina had 26,701 slave owners out of a total free population of 301,302 or 8.86% of all free people owned slaves.
Mississippi had 30,943 slave owners out of a total free population of 354,674 or 8.72% of all free people owned slaves."

Totally irrelevant, if not technically bogus.
That's because no slave-holder lived by himself, all had families and in those days most were quite large families.
This site gives a realistic estimate as to how many families, and what percent of the totals, owned slaves.
Mississippi and South Carolina lead the list at 49% and 46% respectively -- almost half.

What it means is that everybody who could afford to owned slaves and everybody who didn't had close family & friends that did.
In that culture slave-holding was not simply economics, it was a "way of life" that all aspired to participate in.

FLT-bird: "Nope. Your denial is simply false.
Yes the South was indeed prosperous. "

You do realize, right, that in those two sentences you contradicted yourself?
My point was that in 1860 average Deep South whites were better off than anyone else on Earth.
First you claim that "is simply false" then substantially affirm it.

FLT-bird: "It would have been far more wealthy had it not been economically exploited by the Northern states to pay for their industrialization."

First, there was no "exploitation" that Southerners did not themselves agree to -- see previous posts on Democrat rule in Washington, DC.
Second, claims of "unfair" or "undue" burdens on the South are simply false.
Third, it's hard to have any sympathy for claims of "exploitation" from people whose whole economy is based on exploiting slave-labor.

FLT-bird: "Various Northern states enacted various laws to prevent compliance with federal agents attempt’s to recapture escaped slaves."

Just as today Democrats pass "sanctuary cities" laws, and so long as Democrats rule in Washington, DC, they get away with it.
When the other party takes over, it becomes more difficult.
And that was the case until 1861: Democrats ruled Washington, DC, and enforced the laws they considered important, including fugitive slave laws.

FLT-bird: "It was more a means of saying that the Northern states had broken the deal (which they did)."

But the Compromise of 1850 shifted responsibility from states to Federal enforcement, and Democrats ruled Washington, DC.
If they truly wanted stricter enforcement, they could have done it.
Even in 1860, state laws did not nullify Federal law.

But the key point here is that South Carolina specifically had no standing in the Fugitive Slave case because, so far as we know, there were no South Carolina runaway slaves being protected by Northern state personal liberty laws.
Indeed, there were no court cases period brought by South Carolina to redress its grievances against those deplorable, irredeemable baskets of Northern Republicans.

FLT-bird: "It is for each state to determine necessity and not for anybody else.
Also it is completely false to say no Founder ever supported unilateral secession.
I have provided numerous quotes showing this to be false already."

Sorry, but there are no legitimate quotes from any Founder supporting unilateral unapproved declarations of secession at pleasure.
And James Madison spelled out why, here.

Your claim that states themselves can determine their own "necessity" might be worth considering, except that in late 1860 there was no "necessity" of any kind remotely resembling the conditions of 1776 to which our Founders referred by their word "necessary".
Even a highly sympathetic Doughfaced Northern Democratic like President Buchanan could not agree that secessionists had any constitutionally valid reasons.