[GonzoGOP]

It just so happened that the Federal authority was located in the North.

They had never had a problem with Federal authority when they were the ones controlling it. The Southern Democrats had routinely used federal authority to enforce the fugitive slave laws. Clearly trumping the states rights of Northern States. The problem came when massive demographic shifts indicated that they would be a permanent minority in the country after 1860. And thus the federal power they had previously wielded would from then on be wielded against them. Their decision was completely logical (Why play a game you cannot possibly win) but the high moral cause against Federal power by the South is a bit hypocritical.

[Bubba Ho-Tep]

Southerners also had no problem with labeling secession as treason when some northerners made a little noise about it at the Hartford Convention.

[southernsunshine]

To your posts 188 & 189.

I agree with your statement of history. However, there is more to this history than what you have stated. The fact that for some Southern states the EXPANSION of the Federal governments power, at that time, was viewed as a threat to individual freedoms and property rights, for one.

IMHO it is a mistake to lump all Southern states or all Northern states into “North” and “South” when studying our history. Individual states did not view all the issues the same regardless of which side they eventually wound up on. I have found that state by state research of the Civil War history to be most helpful in forming my own opinions.

I don’t recall a claiminig a “high moral cause against Federal power by the South”. I simply pointed out that the Federal government was physically located in the North.

Perhaps I just don’t understand your point.