Manaia, I'm sorry in my one statement bothered you. Instead of trying to go into a lot of details, I simply used this statement to keep things simple, hoping to avoid any problems on the list. However, since this statement bother's you, I feel I should elaborate on what I meant when I stated, "The Southern states seceded from the Union and just wanted to be left alone." Although the war was fought over a number of reasons, and I'm not going to get into all of these, the primary factor was that of most wars: MONEY. Many Southerners believed that the Federal government had been acting in an unconstitutional manner for many years, particularly with regard to its fiscal and trade policies, with these policies imposing disproportionate harm on the South. During this time prior to the war, the South was the primary source of all federal revenue. The South had only a small manufacturing base, with most of its manufactured goods coming from the North or Europe. Since the South was so dependent on trade, by 1860 the Southern states were paying in excess of 80% of all tariffs in the country, with most of this money being spent in the North on industrialization. Before secession, the Morrill Tariff bill even proposed raising the current tariff rate by as much as 250% on some items. Even as early as 1828, Senator Thomas H. Benton stated the following: "Before the Revolution [the South] was the seat of wealth as well as hospitality. Wealth has fled from the South, and settled in regions north of the Potomac: and this in the face of the fact, that the South, in four staples alone, has exported produce, since the Revolution, to the value of eight hundred millions of dollars; and the North has exported comparatively nothing. Such an export would indicate unparalleled wealth, but what is the fact? Under Federal legislation, the exports of the South have been the basis of the Federal revenue. Virginia, the two Carolinas, and Georgia, may be said to defray three-fourths of the annual expense of supporting the Federal Government; and of this great sum, annually furnished by them, nothing or next to nothing is returned to them in the shape of Government expenditures. That expenditure flows in an opposite direction - it flows northwardly, in on uniform, uninterrupted, and perennial stream. This is the reason why wealth disappears from the South and rises up in the North. Federal legislation does all this." In one message to Congress, President James Buchanan even stated, "The South had not had her share of money from the treasury, and unjust discrimination had been made against her." Also, when Lincoln was asked why the North should let the South go by many, his reply was, "Let the South go? Let the South go! Where then shall we get our revenues?" To sum it up, the Southern States wished to form their own government in a peaceful manner, where the wealth of the South would stay in the South to help her people instead of helping the North grow into an even bigger industrial giant. Edward