Penny,

"Reading that, one almost has the impression that you believe AL found slavery morally reprehensible aside from the fact that he thought it a darned bad deal for the white race to have to live in the same country with them, free or not."

Lincoln did find slavery morally reprehensible (there is no doubt about that), and he did believe that the racial situation in the country was unfortunate---for both whites and blacks.

"I just think the underlying reasons that the peculiar institution was a problem are too often misrepresented. When we say today that slavery is morally wrong, we usually mean racial inequality is wrong. I don't think Lincoln thought that and neither did the great majority of people North or South in his day."

Well, I think when people today say slavery is morally wrong, they mean that racial inequality is wrong AND forcefully denying someone basic rights of liberty is wrong. Lincoln and most people in the northern states believed slavery was morally wrong, but still believed that whites were superior to blacks in many ways. We cannot lump white supremacy and American slavery so easily together (although they cannot be separated). Americans in the nineteenth century could be white supremacists while opposing slavery. Americans, however, could not support slavery and oppose white supremacy.

"Sorry Craig, but you've never convinced me that underlying all that talk about slavery was [not] the very real and long-standing disagreement over state sovereignty and the original intent of the U.S. Constitution. I think slavery was often used as a kind of "short-hand" (i.e. understood to be about) these greater very real, but more abstract issues. Not always, but often enough to be notable."

There should be no doubt that questions over constitutional issues, including states' rights, were very much involved in the sectional conflict. However, I would challenge your view of the relationship between slavery and these political views.

Some people today claim that slavery was a part or a facade of the states versus federal power debate. In fact, the states versus federal power debate at the eve of the war was a development from the institution of slavery. I do not mean to say that state versus federal questions originated completely from slavery differences, but that HOW they developed up to 1860 was shaped by slavery.

There is a fantastic article by Arthur M. Schlesinger called "The State Rights Fetish," which is reprinted in _Causes of the Civil War_, ed. Kenneth Stampp. (It was originally printed in Schlesinger's _New Viewpoints in American History_, but I have a copy of Stampp's book.) Schlesinger expertly explains the relationship of state rights and the Civil War. He writes,

"Writers and teachers of American history are accustomed to use the phrase [state rights] as if it furnished a fundamental explanation of the motivation of events. That this is far form true any detailed examination of American history should make apparent; and indeed the expression itself has born different meanings at differen epochs or as understood by different leaders in the same epoch . . ." (Schlesinger, in _Causes of the Civil War_, 47.)

Schlesinger's article echoes Alexander Johnston's argument that "almost every state in the Union in turn declared its own 'sovereignty,' and denounced as almost treasonable similar declarations in other cases by other states." Schlesinger further states that "political parties ahve been almost as variable in this respect as the states. Throughout the discussion it will appear that economic interest or some other local advantage has usually determined the attitude of states and parties toward the questions of constitutional construction."(Schlesinger, 48)

He points to examples of northern states emphasizing state sovereignty during political issues they feared or opposed, including the Hartford Convention in 1814 and during the Mexican War in the 1840s. Southerners often responded to these actions as ridiculous and Furthemore, the fugitive slave law was a particularly contentious issue that literally pitted Southern states championing the power of the national government over state rights. Northerners tried to oppose the fugitive slave law---which required them to turn over runaway blacks hiding in their state---to federal and Southern authorities. Northerners were, according to James Ford Rhodes, "dangerously near the nullification of a United States law." (quoted in Schlesinger, 50) Of course, Southerners argued that such refusal to abide by federal law and authority in this case was dangerous and unexcusable.

Schlesinger's article highlights the reality of all arguments over authority and power---they all involve real interests. No one goes to war simply over a difference of principle. The problem becomes when that difference of principle is seen as a threat to one's interests.

Southerners increasingly emphasized state sovereignty when their institution of slavery became a minority or "peculiar" interest. With more and more northerners, who were antislavery or unconcernd with protecting slavery, entering the government, Southerners realized that they could no longer rely upon the federal government to protect their interests all of the time. Yet, when the federal government DID serve as an ally (such as with the fugitive slave law), Southerners had no problem backing federal authority over states.

True differences over principles of government authority do not manifest themselves so cleanly along geographical lines. We cannot assume that there just happened to be something in the water of the South that made them more interested in state rights than people in northern states. Very specific interests led to the difference of constitutional interpretation. The interests Southerners talked about during this period all came back to slavery.

Overall, slavery was not a part of the state versus federal power argument...it was the reason that conflict played out as it did.