I honestly do believe that there was a fair measure of states’ rights involved with the Civil War, along with a significant role played by the economy between the states of the time (consider the massive blockade shortly following the battle of Fort Sumter).
However, you’d have to be somewhat ignorant of history to deny that slaves had a role. Slavery was an integral part of the Southern economy at the time. Though the notion of one man owning hundreds upon hundreds of slaves is somewhat exaggerated - very few Southerners owned more than a few slaves, and IIRC, there existed less than ten that owned more than a few hundred - you can’t ignore this facet. Looking at the writings and letters of Southern politicians would reveal a genuine notion of superiority over blacks, which was only enforced by the Dred Scott Decision shortly before the war began.
Personally, given the industrialization going on throughout Western Civilization - plus the efforts of the British in shutting down the African Slave trade many years prior - I believe that the necessity of slavery as an economic institution would have passed away as machinery took a larger role. Who knows, without the bad blood instigated by the Civil War and the ensuing Reconstruction - which in and of itself blew up over the bad blood between the various Compromises of years past that attempted to mitigate the free/slave state issue - perhaps the issue of rights for colored people would’ve been a lot smoother.
Alas, what happened happened.
I certainly would prescribe some measure of nobility to various peoples of the Confederacy. As for nobility of the CSA itself? Not so much...maybe just a little.
Do you think if the south had freed their slaves in September of 1862 IAW with the emancipation proclamation, the war would have ended right there and then. Please justify your answers, if possible.
When you look at legislation from that era such as the Fugitive Slave Act or the Dred Scott decision, you will see that states rights, or even individual rights for that matter, were not all that important to them.
It was a handy phrase, but that's about it.
I believe that the necessity of slavery as an economic institution would have passed away as machinery took a larger role.
The first practical cotton harvesters did not come into use until the 1950s.
I'd also remind you that mechanization and slavery are not necessarly incompatible. See China.