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In deciding which one should emotionally vicariously support, if one
is a history buff given to looking at things from perspectives of its
inhabitants, we must consider two things.

The south wanted self-determination and economic policies which were
good for its characteristics and institutions. Specifically, they
wanted laissez-faire free trade. They wanted to be agricultural and
stay agricultural. They did, however, have black slavery, which was
pernicious-as many of their own leading intellectuals thought, and for
reasons which were obvious then but not commonly considered now. Was
it because the blacks were deprived of liberty and treated harshly?
Well, they were, but that wasn't the reason. Black slaves were treated
much better than white indentured servants, because black slaves were
valuable livestock. White indentured servants were far more cavalierly
treated and died at a much higher rate than the blacks. The reason was
that black slavery brought large numbers of an incompatible people to
the country who could not be anything but a separate nation. Add in
the versipellous, insidious catalyst we all know of and the results
have been lethal. However, slavery was not the reason for the war per
se.

The North wanted parity with Europe generally and England
specifically in terms of technology, and to do it they, sensibly and
correctly, knew they needed tariffs to do it. A laissez faire economy
is like a large dog left by its owners in a house over an extended
weekend. Left food and water for three days, it will eat the entire
amount in ten minutes, drink all the water, and **** and **** all over
the floor thereafter. Building infrastructure takes time and effort
and importing an off the rack solution is quick and turns a known
profit. British industry was far superior to the American as late as
1890 and in some ways was not equalled in the US until the demands of
Lend-Lease. When Packard took the beautifully engineered but
marginably productionable Rolls Royce Merlin and turned it into the
V-1650-9 engine used in 9,400 P-51D Mustangs plus many Spitfires and
Mosquitoes the torch had only then been fully passed. (One could also
argue that the Cosworth DVF/DFX is still the structurally finest
internal combustion engine ever built, but that would be an otiose
argument at this juncture.)

Separation, therefore, was a reasonable argument. Is it unfortunate
that the South didn't win? Perhaps.

Is it unfortunate that eighty years later history repeated itself and
for the same reasons on a global scale? That argument too can be
made.

The essential point is this: the central cause of victory in each
case was manufacturing. We forget that at our certain peril.