I do think black slavery was a ticking time bomb for the United States from the very beginning. Most of the founding fathers had been slave holders at one time or another including John Adams and Ben Franklin if I remember correctly. George Washington, the father of his country, was a exacting and demanding slave master. I think due to different and unequal economic development in the northern states and southern states some sort of conflict was inevitable. Probably if not for King Cotton and the world's insatiable demand for it then perhaps slavery would have gradually disappeared. Slavery was basic to the economy of the south and many of the border states as well. Cotton and tobacco were the money crops and were labor intensive. Did the conflict between north and south have to end in a bloodbath. John Brown thought it did and said so before he was hanged. I have read that the constitution could never have been ratified if abolishing slavery had been one of its requirements. So our nation was built on black slavery from day one. I am sure if black slavery had been economically worthwhile in the north it would still have existed just like in the south. Northerners imported cheap labor from Europe like the starving Irish to do their labor that no one else would do.

In the media it seems the civil war has been boiled down to the war to end slavery. This was Lincoln's plan to turn a war over secession into a holy war to free the slaves. It seems to have worked except for the draft riots in NYC which was an anti-black riot led by Irish immigrants who did not want to die to free people who would compete with them for jobs. I think that the Ken Burns series about the Civil War was so successful because Americans are so ignorant of history and willing to believe any nonsense they are told.