So war it was after all? And the South started it? Well you can't very well complain when things don't turn out quite like you had expected, can you?
Who owns Federal Property?
The government. Or if you want to get right down to it the people of the United States. That would be all the people, North as well as South. So what would give the people of South Carolina the right to just take it without compensating all the owners? Isn't their share of the property worth something?
Lincoln maintained a fort within the territory of South Carolina, a State that considered itself seceded and no longer part of the United States, thus this was a foreign military facility. That would normally be considered justified.
“The government. “
False.
“Or if you want to get right down to it the people of the United States. That would be all the people, North as well as South.”
The people of South Carolina took back only the property they had originally ceded the Federal government.
I know your agenda here: “South bad guys, North shining knights in armor”, but that isn’t true. Neither side was the “good guys”. Lincoln fought to preserve what was supposed to be a freely entered into Federation at gun point. That’s exactly what that fort was - a loaded gun pointing at a major economic center of the nascent Confederacy.
Perhaps if he HAD withdrawn, an accommodation could have been reached, but frankly, both sides were spoiling for a fight.