Too many times, the war’s causes are reduced to an either-or fallacy: it was fought as a defense for slavery or as a defense of states’ rights.   Within this fallacy many present the argument of Southern exceptionalism–the argument that the South twisted constitutional interpretations and deviated from the Founders’ intent.  (A strong case for Northern exceptionalism can be made; after all, the “market revolution,” government subsidies, and the antebellum social changes and their effects occurred on a greater scale in the northern states than in southern ones.)

Notice that all the causes deal essentially with why the South fought the war.  For a more complete understanding of the war’s causes, one should also ask why the North fought the war and remember that the widespread anti-slavery movement and the less prevalent abolitionist movement had two entirely different goals for the nation, for slavery, and for the relationship between whites and blacks. 

In the end, some things that were never agreed upon during the ratification process were hammered out on the battlefield, and the United States stopped being an “are” and became and “is.” 

(There is much more that can be written, but I’ll stop here).