The Civil War was an unjustified invasion and the Southern states should have been allowed to secede

I first wanna give a shout out to my opponent, he ain't so bad, he's a cold mother with bro skills that'll make you say WHOMP! Anyway let's ice it up "The issue is that all land in the United States is property of the US Government." This is not true, land in a certain state is owned by the state government and the national government. But in this case I would say that the state has precedence because of the 10th amendment: "The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people." The power of ownership of land is not exclusively granted the U.S. government by the constitution, so therefore when there is a conflict this right is to be held by the states. Also the example of the states existing in the Louisiana Territory seceding and therefore stealing that land from the national government, is not fully comparable to this situation. Only Arkansas and small parts of Louisiana and Texas was part of the Louisiana Territory, the vast majority of the seceding states were on land not bought by the U.S. government. "The South and North had been balancing slave and free states for many years, so the South had its ability to choose to apply for secession through the Federal system." That may be relevant if the only reason for the south's secession was slavery. While I believe it was a large reason, I believe the tariffs and states rights issues were larger reasons. Most of the concessions, as you said, were in regards to balancing slave or non-slave states, such as the Compromise of 1850. However these compromises did not address the larger problems of tariffs and states rights. Like I said the north and the south had been trying for almost a century to legally resolve their disputes, but the south became so upset with the way the national government was treating them, they seceded. "'Justified' implies Justice, and just or not, it is the responsibility of the US government to protect and enforce its laws for/against its people and property" Justify is defined as: "to show (an act, claim, statement, etc.) to be just or right" (http://dictionary.reference.com...). Being justified does not necessarily mean being legal, it extends beyond the realm of laws, it deals with what is morally right. This is in response to clsmooth's comment I agree that the tariff issues were a greater reason for the secession, however, while slavery did exist the north, it was much more a part of the southern states' economy and lifestyle. People were pushing for amendments to ban slavery before the war, the south wanted to free itself from U.S. jurisdiction before that happened. Slavery was a southern reason for war not a Union reason for war. "there were still slave states loyal to the Union." Many of the slave states that supported the Union were forced by Lincoln to remain part of the Union, notably Maryland, because DC resides within it's borders and if Lincoln hadn't done this, Maryland would have probably joined the Confederacy. Also I never said I agreed with the view that the Civil War was historically a good thing, I just said I understood it. As far as Lincoln being a neocon Hamiltonian, I'm totally with you.