"The ingenious Constitution would have been overthrown and withered away, along with the great nation it forged and sustains. A loose "confederation" had been tried once before and was thoroughly discredited as an impractical, hopeless, hare-brained way to form and maintain an effective, efficient, and JUST system of nationhood -- and was brilliantly superseded by a national treasure -- which has survived many tests -- including this most severe one."

The U.S. Constitution did not survive the Civil War intact. By 1867 it was no longer a firm Constitution but a biased and legislatively controlled document. It was believed so flawed the victorious North rewrote it to fit their needs and punish the South. The U.S. Constitution was hated by the abolitionist groups prior to the war, groups who also wanted and believed that secession was a correct and legal action.

The Articles of Confederation, a perpetual law, never to be undone, was overthrown by secession of certain States when they ratified the U.S. Constitution. Those ratifying States threatened the minority of States, those that did not ratify the U.S. Constitution, with economic ruin if they did not do so.