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I am probably a bit older than you, but when I was in school, we were taught that the Civil War was about states rights first, and slavery second … and I grew up in Washington. If you want to read an interesting article about Federalism, and how the Civil War changed it, including why the South thought they did indeed have the right to secede, see here. https://quod.lib.umich.edu/j/jala/2629860.0010.103/--abraham-lincoln-and-federalism?rgn=main;view=fulltext

If you don't want to read the entire article, the short version is the Articles of Confederation (passed March 1, 1781) were signed as independent sovereignties, and the Constitution (passed in 1788) refers to "We the people of the United STATES … with the State being the operative entity. Each state ratified the Constitution, not in a national election by individuals, but as States. Rights were built into the Constitution for States, as well as individuals. Included in these is the 10th Amendment and the interpretation that the Federal Government only had specific delegated powers.

Now, overlay on that the fact that the North had a greater population, smaller land mass, and was more industrialized, and the South was agrarian. Because of the way representation is divided in Congress, this gave the North an advantage when passing laws, and taxation was designed so that the underrepresented South payed a significantly higher share towards Federal Revenue than the North because of the types of products and services they needed versus the North (there were no income taxes back then). In short, the Federal Government began issuing tariffs, even though that was a power not delegated to it by the States, and the tariffs were hurting the South.

Madison conceded to Jefferson in his writings that the Marshall Supreme Court abused its power in by expanding national authority and restricting that of states. The question of whether the law of the Union or the law of the State was subordinate was actually very much play, and can be read about in Charles Goodrich's "Science of Government" published in 1853.

Slavery became an issue because of Federalism, and whether the Federal government had any legal authority to do anything about it. There were those trying to use both the Commerce Clause (but it failed because the right to regulate Commerce did not include the right to ban it, specifically to ban slaves), and Article 4, Section 2 of the Constitution to provide Federal protection to those from one state entering another state to try to change the opinions of the people or that States laws. In short, the use and expansion of Federalism was being applied in such a way to punish the South economically, as well as through supporting insurrections by non-Citizens of the State.

Finally, the pre-Civil War Democrat Party (specifically the Jacksonian line of Presidents) was a party that opposed Nationalism (see Jackson's fights against a Central Bank, etc), whereas the Republicans were a Nationalist wing of the Whig Party. To get elected however, Lincoln pledged "No Interference" with State Power over Slavery … again, pointing that the argument was with Federalism, not Slavery.