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"According to Article I of the constitution, the feds are required to put down rebellions"

There was no rebellion. The Southern States seceded from the Union, and Lincoln had no authority to rule that they could not. Slavery was safe in the Union as evidenced by the fact that there were UNION SLAVE STATES, including Delaware which kept slavery to the end. They voted against the 13th Admenment, saying that slavery was a States' Rights issue.

There was no rebellion. The Southern States seceded from the Union, and Lincoln had no authority to rule that they could not. Slavery was safe in the Union as evidenced by the fact that there were UNION SLAVE STATES, including Delaware which kept slavery to the end. They voted against the 13th Admenment, saying that slavery was a States' Rights issue.

Even so noted an authority on the Constitution as James Madison indicated the nullification rights proposed by Calhoun did not, in fact, exist. In order to constitutionally secede from the Union, there would have to be a mechanism provided to do so, the individual states would have to have supreme sovereignty or there would have to be rebellion. We know that there is no mechanism so provided and we also know that none of the states have supreme sovreignty (the supremacy clause of the constitution puts it above any state laws and enjoins stated judges to obey the constitution first, state laws second). That leaves only rebellion.

Yes, slavery was safe in the north. Since the south rebelled primarily because of the slavery issue, this sort of knocks the underpinnings out of the secessionists' arguments.