[I]n a liberal democracy, sovereignty lies in the people at large; and our governing structures exist to implement that will. - Allen C. Guelzo

But secession struck to an even deeper level, to the very roots of popular government. The seceding states made their bolt for the door not in response to invasion or military occupation or internal taxation, but because their favored candidates did not win a presidential election. The genius of popular government was wound around the twin propositions that majorities have the privilege of winning, and that minorities have the obligation to be cooperative losers. Secession was a declaration of non-cooperation with a national vote, and since the United States in 1860 was virtually the only large-scale example of a successful popular democracy, the threat that the American republic would fracture over a lost election seemed to call into question the entire workability of popular government.

[R]eligious commitment formed the backbone of much of the North's hostility to slavery.

The cotton nabobs had made the South a no-go area for the Constitution...