I doubt our Confederate ancestors gave a damn whether the U.S. Supreme Court gave their blessings for them to exercise their God given rights. The Confederate States of America was a short lived nation that was conquered by a larger nation, led by a ruthless regime. All revisionist books, false memorials, holidays and Lincoln Truthers can never change the facts. And 600,000 or 620,000 dead soldiers is a gross underestimate of the carnage. With civilians and irregular soldiers, the death toll was surely over 670,000 men, women and children.

" We protest solemnly in the face of mankind, that we desire peace at any sacrifice, save that of honor. In independence we seek no conquest, no aggrandizement, no concession of any kind from the states with which we have lately been confederated. All we ask is to be let alone – that those who never held power over us shall not now attempt our subjugation by arms. This we will, we must resist to the direst extremity. The moment that this pretension is abandoned, the sword will drop from our grasp, and we shall be ready to enter into treaties of amnesty and commerce that cannot but be mutually beneficial. So long as this pretension is maintained, with a firm reliance on that Divine Power which covers with its protection the just cause, we must continue to struggle for our inherent right to freedom, independence, and self government."

– President Jefferson Davis' first address to the Confederate Congress