While the question of abolishion of slavery was undoubtedly a part of the political rhetoric of the times. The institution was quite pervasive in the north.

The North saw the slave as a house servant. The South saw him as a field hand.

In any case the common preception of the southern position was a "Straw Man" or "Straw Dog" argument, which said that the southerner wanted to keep slavery. While the Southerners real argument was a question of Constitutional Interpretation, and the Rule of Law.

Another part of the Southern argument which we are just today begining to answer was 'So you free the slaves, what are you going to do with them then?'

The United States Government answer to that question was - "we are not going to do anything". Free them and we are through with them, they are on their own.

We have paid for 100 years of that mistake. The South wanted an emancipation which allowed the slaves to assimulate into the society.

The southerners correctly foresaw the problems that immediately freeing 4,000,000 unskilled, uneducated, people, who owned no property on an economy which was primarily agricultural and based on land ownership to provide food for ones self and family. The problem was that while it would have been tough before the war to have supported such a large number of people, it was even more impossible after the war when the entire southern economy was destroyed.