Secession was raised as both a threat and a possibility by numerous states practically from the moment our country was created. The struggle between Federalism (where the good of the whole takes precedence over the individual states) and states rights takes up 2 volumes in the Library of America series. Gradually, as the 19th Century unfolded, secession became a greater and greater threat by the South, where the issue of slavery and its spread dominated the thinking. It was believed (falsely it turns out) that the United States could spread slavery (and its dominion) into Mexico, Cuba and Central America (the term "filibuster" was coined around some mountebanks who thought to take over Nicaragua).

But the South was not the only region thinking of leaving the Union, and when the Civil War broke out, there was even some fear the Northwest states (Minnesota, Wisconsin and others) would break off into their own region.

Bill

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