the WBTS was about LIBERTY for dixie.
there were about 100 minor causes, but NONE approached the lust of southerners to be FREE from political/social/business/academic/financial domination by the northern ELITISTS out of DAMNyankeeland, primarily NY & new england.
face it, you've been lied to and made a fool of by the LEFTIST/fascists, out of the "poison ivy league" & "left coast" schools, who wouldn't spit on you if you caught fire. (in point of fact, such elitists ridicule & laugh AT anyone who is foolish enough to believe their KNOWING lies.)
only about 5-6% of northerners/southerners had slaves. those slave-OWNERS were extremely concerned about preservation of the "peculiar institution".
FEW other people cared a damn about either slavery or about "the plight of the slaves". they SHOULD have;they did NOT.
further, FEW people, north or south, cared enough about "some rich guy's right to have slaves" to fight a SKIRMISH over it, much less a major WAR.
this is especially true of the CSA soldiers/sailors/marines, as the AVERAGE of GROSS ASSETS of those servicemen/women was LESS than $ 25.oo US (people that poor couldn't have bought a slave, had they wanted one!). the CSA service-members fought for their city/county/parish/state, each other & for FREEDOM from a faraway central government, which they believed (CORRECTLY) was NOT acting in their informed self-interest & which was likely to become evermore intrusive into their lives.
further, the common soldier/sailor/marine of the CSA was fighting against the WEALTHY/privileged elitists everywhere. (had they won their war for FREEDOM, the "plantation aristocracy" might well been next on the "list of enemies", especially since so many of the dixie aristocrats had COLLOBORATED with the enemy during the war.)
the brave/honorable "Billy Yanks" too, were fighting for a PRINCIPLE: Preserving the Union. generally, they cared NOTHING about the "peculiar institution" OR about the slaves.
free dixie,sw
Yeah. But LIBERTY to do what? We both know the answer to that, son. You're just too cowardly to admit it.
Sure there were plenty of small issues between North and South. And one Big Issue, which was slavery. The big sectional crises that had plagued the Union for decades, and which raised the spectre of war as early as 1850, were about the South wanting to expand slavery into new territories, and the North wanting otherwise. There's no denying that.
And the secessions themselves ... were about slavery. It's no accident that the Southern states began seceding when Lincoln -- perceived as a harbinger if abolition -- was elected. And furthermore, several states said explicitly, in their Declarations of Secession, that it was about slavery. As Mississippi put it:
Our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery-- the greatest material interest of the world. Its labor supplies the product which constitutes by far the largest and most important portions of commerce of the earth. These products are peculiar to the climate verging on the tropical regions, and by an imperious law of nature, none but the black race can bear exposure to the tropical sun. These products have become necessities of the world, and a blow at slavery is a blow at commerce and civilization. That blow has been long aimed at the institution, and was at the point of reaching its consummation. There was no choice left us but submission to the mandates of abolition, or a dissolution of the Union, whose principles had been subverted to work out our ruin. [Emphasis mine.]
Pretty stark stuff. Your argument there, IIRC, is that those declarations are meaningless. A convenient but silly claim on your part.
And, in fact, a lot of the minor causes to which you refer, ultimately had their roots slavery as well ... including the increasingly large gap between the economy of the North (driven by expanding industry, railroads, and the banking system required to finance it); and the economy of the South (driven by slave-produced agricultural goods, primarily cotton).
You can dodge and squeal and use ALL CAPITOL LETTERS all you want, but the real facts are that the war was ultimately caused by the existence of slavery in the South.