> That actually wasn’t why the civil war was started. That's misleading. The war was about slavery, period. Secession was the end result of a long train of c

> That actually wasn’t why the civil war was started. That's misleading. The war was about slavery, period. Secession was the end result of a long train of conflict over slavery going back to the founding of the republic. A quick google pulled up this pretty well curated list (it's literally high school history material, surely you learned this stuff in school?) of "compromises" over the issues that were attempts at holding the republic together: https://herb.ashp.cuny.edu/items/show/1286 https://herb.ashp.cuny.edu/items/show/1286 Well, obviously it failed. In 1861 the slave states collectively decided to take their toys and go home. Now, at this point, it's true that, for political reasons, Union rhetoric was about "preserving the union" and not "emancipating slaves". They didn't immediately announce that now that the compromise had failed that's where they were going. And that's frankly a little shameful. But no one thinks this war was about anything other than the practice of slavery.