Light (@WaveAndParticle)

The American Civil War was about Lincoln and his supporters wishing to enslave the American people. Lincoln supported the Corwin Amendment which would have ensured that slavery was permanent forever in the United States, and hoped that it would prevent the southern states from leaving - but the people of the South - many of whom hoped for a gradual and peaceful end of slavery as had happened in many other countries including the northern states of the United States - did not want to be slaves to northern industrialists - so they left, and Lincoln began planning his war to force them to pay the taxes he so badly wanted. He even offered to allow them to leave if they continued to pay the taxes that he was increasing, but they turned that down too. He was so desperate for war that he even committed acts of war against states which had not seceded, just because he feared they might. Waging war against the United States is the very Constitutional definition of treason. Mr Lincoln didn't bring up emancipation until the war was well under way, in order to prevent foreign nations from intervening on behalf of the Confederacy.