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Virginia, another of the most powerful states in the Union, also stated quite clearly in their ratification statement that they too had the right to take back their powers given up to the Federal government.

You can sign a contract with all kinds of reservations, objections and provisos, but if you don't write them into the document they aren't going to be recognized by the other parties to the contract.

They knew little of the larger economics, but the wealthy and powerful industrialists and money men were acutely aware of the economic conditions in the country, and the existing system funneled 200-230 million dollars of Southern produced trade through the pockets of New Yorkers and Washington DC officials.

Which is why they didn't want a war. They didn't want to upset prevailing trade patterns.

If those patterns were disrupted what makes you think the new commercial middlemen would be more efficient and more beneficial to the slave owners than the old ones were?

And was Washington's cut really more than Richmond's would be?

The national government has steadily sought to facilitate restoration with adequate guaranties of union, order, and equal rights. On no occasion, however, and by no act, have the United States ever renounced their constitutional jurisdiction over the whole territory or over all the citizens of the republic, or conceded to citizens in arms against their country the character of alien enemies, or admitted the existence of any government de facto, hostile to itself within the boundaries of the Union. In the Prize Cases the supreme court simply assented the right of the United States to treat the insurgents as belligerents, and to claim from foreign nations the performance of neutral duties under the penalties known to international law. These decisions recognized, also, the fact of the exercise and concession of belligerent rights, and affirmed, as a necessary consequence, the proposition that during the war all the inhabitants of the country controlled by the rebellion, and all the inhabitants of the country loyal to the Union, were enemies reciprocally each of the other. But there is nothing in that opinion which gives countenance to the doctrine which counsel endeavor to deduce from it, that the insurgent states, by the act of rebellion, and by levying war against the nation, became foreign states, and their inhabitants alien enemies.

You can sign a contract with all kinds of reservations, objections and provisos, but if you don't write them into the document they aren't going to be recognized by the other parties to the contract.

They wrote it into the prior contract which they all signed.

Which is why they didn't want a war. They didn't want to upset prevailing trade patterns.

This is correct, but this position was contingent on the trade patterns remaining the same. When it became clear that much of New York's import traffic would move to Charleston, to Mobile, to New Orleans, that put an entirely different face on the situation.

Everyone is in favor of a situation that profits them, and everyone is against someone taking away their situation which is profiting them.

If those patterns were disrupted what makes you think the new commercial middlemen would be more efficient and more beneficial to the slave owners than the old ones were?

Well first of all, prices would come down because the Government wasn't taking such a big bite out of everything. So on just that point alone, everyone would be making more money on the deal.

Secondly, the shipping costs which were controlled by the New York area shipping industries were set at just below what it would cost to ship using foreign ships or crew with payment of all the fines thus entailed. By eliminating the "Navigation act of 1817", Shipping costs would have been dramatically reduced, further putting more money into everyone's pockets except for the North Eastern industries.

To see what was going on, you have to look at the economics of the whole picture. I assure you Northern shipping executives were fully aware of the threat Southern independence would pose to their industry. Same with Bankers, same with Insurance agents, same with Warehousers, same with Manufacturers. They all had reason to fear and hate the South harming their business by lowering tariffs and eschewing their overpriced shipping.

And was Washington's cut really more than Richmond's would be?

It certainly would be starting out.