George, I did not mean to imply that slavery was a cause for the war. My point is there would not have been a war without slavery. The South's economy would not have been so immense as to fund the great infrastructure of the North or tempt Northern businessmen and politicians to rob Southerners with egregious tariffs. There would not have been a war without Secession and there would have been no Secession without slavery. The ultimate "cause" of the war was the Lincoln regime's desire to trash the 9th and 10th Amendments and transform the federal government while destroying the States' Rights to be sovereign.