The unending quest of historians for understanding the past — that is, 'revisionism' — is what makes history vital and meaningful. - James M. McPherson

Lincoln was the only president in American history whose administration was bounded by war.

While one or more of these interpretations remain popular among the Sons of Confederate Veterans and other Southern heritage groups, few professional historians now subscribe to them. Of all these interpretations, the states' rights argument is perhaps the weakest. It fails to ask the question, states' rights for what purpose? States' rights, or sovereignty, was always more a means than an end, an instrument to achieve a certain goal more than a principle.

What were these rights and liberties for which Confederates contended? The right to own slaves; the liberty to take this property into the territories.