“Through the magic of harvesting money out of Northern trees to pay for things.”
So now you’re saying the North produced no economic activity, and were relying on the South to pay for everything?
To recap:
The reason for secession was the South’s desire to preserve slavery.
The trigger for secession was the election of Abraham Lincoln, which fed fear of the abolitionist foundation of the Republican Party.
The American Civil War began when units of the South Carolina Militia fired upon a Union fort in Charleston harbor.
I am saying the North produced 28% of the European exports and the South produced 72% of the European exports.
You somehow believe that the North could buy nearly 3/4ths of the imports without explaining how it is possible to buy these things with only 28% of the money. You are suffering cognitive dissonance here.
They could not do it without somehow getting that money away from the Southern producers who created the trade deficit with Europe.
And therein lies the hidden (through deliberate propaganda) reason for the war.