*rollseyes*
Instead of a rehearsed "all to blame" knee-jerk, can we please acknowledge the lion's share of the blame so that we may empirically conclude that it was the fucking North that was responsible not simply for trying to force their values and policies on the South but also defy the constitution and start a ridiculous war that cost hundreds of thousands of lives just so Lincoln wouldn't have to say he let the union dissolve?
Also, Southern culture was not nearly as overtly supremacist as modern armchair historians would have us believe. While the South had the most slave owners, they could hardly be associated with the common Southern man. The reality is that slavery was out the door anyway. On that note, Lincoln wasn't even averse the idea of letting it continue as long as the succession was put to an end--a proposal that was refused of course.
The very existence of the Confederate flag defies the idea of a federal monopoly over the states. That's the only reason the left truly hates that flag.
But, noting your implication that the everyday Confederate citizen may well have been as or more impoverished than your average slave (I don't know), the political elite of the Confederacy had different views:
Article I, Section 9, Clause 4 prohibited the Confederate government from restricting slavery in any way:
"No bill of attainder, ex post facto law, or law denying or impairing the right of property in negro slaves shall be passed."
Article IV, Section 2 also prohibited states from interfering with slavery:
"The citizens of each State shall be entitled to all the privileges and immunities of citizens in the several States; and shall have the right of transit and sojourn in any State of this Confederacy, with their slaves and other property; and the right of property in said slaves shall not be thereby impaired."
Perhaps the most menacing provision of the Confederate States Constitution was the explicit protection Article IV, Section 3, Clause 3 offered to slavery in all future territories conquered or acquired by the Confederacy:
"The Confederate States may acquire new territory; and Congress shall have power to legislate and provide governments for the inhabitants of all territory belonging to the Confederate States, lying without the limits of the several States; and may permit them, at such times, and in such manner as it may by law provide, to form States to be admitted into the Confederacy. In all such territory the institution of negro slavery, as it now exists in the Confederate States, shall be recognized and protected by Congress and by the Territorial government; and the inhabitants of the several Confederate States and Territories shall have the right to take to such Territory any slaves lawfully held by them in any of the States or Territories of the Confederate States."
This provision ensured the perpetuation of slavery as long and as far as the Confederate States could extend it's political reach, and more then a few Confederates had their eyes fixed on Cuba and Central and South America as objects of future conquest.
So, the Confederate constitution itself contemplates slavery as a federal institution and one which could be extended through territorial acquisition. So, I guess, if the Confederate army had acquired, I don't know, Rhode Island (from memory of a train ride in 2010, north of NY but south of Boston, so my example is improbable), then slavery could be practiced there without inhibition from the Confederate government. Legally, that doesn't sound like slavery was on its way out.
Practically, I assume the English blockade on slave ships wasn't super effective, and that the economics of a slaving nation are lucrative. But I don't know the reality of that, and you didn't embellish on your position of the causes of a decline in slavery in the South pre-Civil War.
Nothing otherwise to say on this post: I am in the position of not having an opinion through lack of knowledge on the history and causes of the war. What you say is interesting and doesn't seem improbable.
