Miller, folks have been squabbling about causation since the war started. Growing up in the South, I always heard one side of the story from family and school. It weighed heavily on the tariff/states' rights side. I began to hear the other side at a family dinner over 20 years ago with my late father-in-law and his brother, both from the deep south,southern to the core, and serious students of history. My wife's uncle was William Wright Abbot one of the nation's premier authorities on the history of Colonial America and George Washington. He also knew more about the history of the Civil War than anyone I knew. I opined that it was caused by tariffs or states' rights and wasn't about slavery. I then heard the other side of the story. Four of the seceding states, Georgia, SC, Mississippi and Texas filed in addition to the articles of secession, declarations of why they did it and slavery topped the list. These can be easily found on the internet. At least for these 4 states, others may make a reasonable conclusion as to causation differing from yours. In 1861, Alexander Stephens, veep of the CSA and former senator from Ga. who resisted the efforts of secession but went whole hog afterwards made a speech in Savannah, his famous Cornerstone Speech. Stephens stated the cause of the war was slavery and that slaves were clearly inferior to the white race, the slave masters, and that it was the natural order of things for them to be enslaved. https://www.csmonitor.com/Books/chapter-...ate-battle-flag
Gil