[brightball]

I'm not going to overinvest my time here because this is a long road. All my above points stand, but you need to reread them.

The quotes were to provide you with context on the economic impact secession was going to have on the northern economy (which would have been devastating). I'm well aware of everything left out of the Wikipedia timeline, but it's a locked topic with 15,000 plus edits.

If you want a better understanding of the subject, there are a lot of books to satisfy your curiousity.