If the North had fought the Civil War to free slaves it would have been a just war.
If the North fought the Civil War to preserve the Union, it was a violation of Federalism and a contradiction of every principle on which this country was founded, and the beginning of our loss of liberty.
Which was it? The motives bleed into each other.
The Civil War, wasn’t.
It was the second war for independence, and it failed.
The recently formed Republicans Party (Anti-Slavery) won the majority in both houses of Congress and the Presidency in 1860 after huge gains in the 1856 election. All Republicans were from states other than those that became part of the Confederacy. The South chose to secede believing the Radical Republicans would strangle their states rights, economic (e.g., tariffs) and socially (right to hold slaves) leaving the Abolitionists (and a somewhat more conservative Lincoln) in control of the government. Almost immediately Lincoln and the Radical Republicans (majority) embarked upon emancipation legislation and continued it throughout the Civil War and thereafter. The Radical Republicans did not loose control of the Congress and Presidency for decades, except for a short time when Andrew Johnson succeed Lincoln.
During the 1864 presidential election Lincoln received a majority of the military vote, though the aggregate numbers were not great.
If the North had fought the Civil War to free slaves it would have been a just war.
...and if the Confederates hadn’t shelled Fort Sumter, providing Lincoln with the very spark he needed to mobilize for war, how different might things have turned out...
...when examining war, look to see who struck the first actual blow...