check u.s. v. texas (1869). you're wrong. you don't have a constitutional right to secede. of course, that decision came AFTER the war.
the union held jefferson davis for several years after the war but never tried him for treason, ultimately releasing him without charge. why? because every constitutional expert they consulted told the feds they'd lose the case.
it's all kind of moot because whether one has a right to secede was really an issue decided at gunpoint.
I believe that you are referring to Texas v White, the 1869 decision where the Supreme Court ruled that the Texas acts of secession were unconstitutional. But even in that decision, Chief Justice Chase noted that the "...union between Texas and the other States was as complete, as perpetual, and as indissoluble as the union between the original States. There was no place for reconsideration or revocation, except through revolution or through consent of the States." It was the unilateral aspect of the acts of secession that the court believed violated the Constitution, not necessarily secession itself.
the union held jefferson davis for several years after the war but never tried him for treason, ultimately releasing him without charge. why? because every constitutional expert they consulted told the feds they'd lose the case.
Again you are not quite correct. True, Davis never went to trial. But he was charged with treason and sundry other crimes. And far from "every constitutional expert they consulted told the feds they'd lose the case," Davis never went to trial because Chief Justice Chase said that the passage of the 14th Amendment meant that additional trial and punishment would violate his 5th Amendment protections against double jeopardy.
it's all kind of moot because whether one has a right to secede was really an issue decided at gunpoint.
That was the choice that the south made. And they paid quite a price for their actions.