Oh, pooh. Secession had everything to do with slavery. It was the culmination of the controversy that informed the Missouri Compromise, the Great Compromise of 1850, and the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854. Those were all predicated on dealing with the Sectional Crisis, which in turn was all about slavery.
Many of the seceeding states said so outright, with Mississipi being perhaps the most explicit:
Our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery-- the greatest material interest of the world. Its labor supplies the product which constitutes by far the largest and most important portions of commerce of the earth. These products are peculiar to the climate verging on the tropical regions, and by an imperious law of nature, none but the black race can bear exposure to the tropical sun. These products have become necessities of the world, and a blow at slavery is a blow at commerce and civilization. That blow has been long aimed at the institution, and was at the point of reaching its consummation. There was no choice left us but submission to the mandates of abolition, or a dissolution of the Union, whose principles had been subverted to work out our ruin.
If you want to talk about "the proper economic role of the central government," it is impossible to do so without facing the fact that the economies of the secessionist states were utterly dependent on slavery. The "economic issue" at hand was nothing more or less than the threat of abolition of slavery, and the ruin it would bring upon the southern economy.
The threat posed to their economic well-being by the abolition movement cannot be dismissed. It is pretty much impossible to imagine secession occurring without the issue of slavery to precipitate it. The gentlemen of Mississippi, Texas, and elsewhere admitted that. If you're interested in facts, you should admit it, too.
The fact you fail to observe the time line of events and suffer cognitive dissonance is not my concern.
LOL! The facts are the facts, sir. You can ignore the facts, but they won't go away.
One State`s reason does not negate the underlying cause.
What they didn`t completely understand was basic economics.
Slavery was economically untenable. The fact that either those in the south or north didn`t get it is testament to their undeveloped economic theories and practices.
“servile labor disappeared because it could not stand the competition of free labor; its unprofitability sealed its doom in the market economy.” (mises.org/pdf/humanaction/pdf/ha_21.pdf)
Why do you ridicule someone who says that secession had little to do with slavery? Even Lincoln admitted the seceding states did not secede because of slavery, and he admitted in his first inaugural address that he did not want to interfere with slavery where it existed and couldn’t constitutionally interfere with it even if he wanted to. The seceding states knew Lincoln could not do a damn thing about slavery. But they did know full well about the Morrill Tariff and Lincoln’s fervent support of same.