If you believe that then you should be able to name something - anything - that the slavers did toward "making progress toward the elimination of slavery". The fact is that the confederates enshrined the Peculiar Institution for all time in their constitution.
Well, they were. There were a growing number of free slaves,,they did not get treated well in all cases, but the numbers were growing.
Secondly, the south had a number of black slave owners at the outbreak of the war.
Lastly, numerous southern freed slaves fought with the confederacy, a fact often glossed over by northern history writers.
It would have taken time, for sure, because the labor force for the plantations had yet to be created and the costs of that would have been sizable and that cost would need to be passed on to the northern mills. Something they were not at all willing to pay.
The war was not about slavery anyway...it was a side issue.
If that were so then why would a few northeastern states seriously consider joining exodus from the federal government, along with the south. It was only federal threat and intimidation that caused them to shelve the idea..
Corwin Amendment. Who outdid whom in the enshrining department?