Ten Neo-Confederate Myths (+one) "Secession was not all about slavery." In fact, a study of the earliest secessionists documents shows, when they bother to give reasons at all, their only major concern was to protect the institution of slavery. For example, four seceding states issued "Declarations of the Immediate Causes Which Induce and Justify Secession from the Federal Union". These documents use words like "slavery" and "institution" over 100 times, words like "tax" and "tariff" only once (re: a tax on slaves), "usurpation" once (re: slavery in territories), "oppression" once (re: potential future restrictions on slavery). So secession wasn't just...