https://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2018/11/13/a-civil-war-lesson-for-the-uneducated/
Slavery was an excuse to secede. It was already legal in the Union, and Lincoln and his Republican majority in Congress tried to make it fully protected as constitutional law through the Corwin Amendment.
My point in posting the article was to spur some thought over culpability for the violence and economic drag that 13% of our population imposes on the rest of us. People who celebrate Confederate heritage don't seem to take that into account.
It is of continued interest to me as to how the Constitution is applied today as compared to how it was intended to be applied at the time of ratification.
Of passing interest is Amendment 1.
At the time of ratification, the States were functionally independent nations, confederated. The empowerment of the Federal government was not terribly unlike the formation of the EU.
Independent nations bound by common currency, and regulation of trade among signatories, etc.
The Constitution laid out what the Federal government could and could not do, and established the structures within which it would/could operate.
At that time, interestingly, the State of Maryland required that all government officials be Roman Catholic. This was in no way seen as a violation of the establishment clause as it was not the Federal government doing the establishment, but the State.
The Constitution governed(s) the actions of the Federal government. The States were largely free to operate without Federal oversight or interference.
Slavery, despite its inherent immorality, was not addressed in the Constitution. Had it been none of the Slave states would have ratified it.
In advance of the Civil War it rightly, probably, should have been addressed as the Abortion issue was recently ruled by the Supreme Court. And for similar reasons.
Was Slavery the cause of the Civil War? In my mind it was not. State’s Rights was the cause.
But Slavery was, without question, the catalyst.