most northerners initially agreed that the war had nothing to do with slavery. In his message to the special session of Congress on July 4, 1861, Lincoln reaffirmed that he had “no purpose, directly or indirectly, to interfere with slavery in the States where it exists.” The Constitution protected slavery in those states; the Lincoln administration fought the war on the theory that secession was unconstitutional and therefore the southern states still lived under the Constitution. Congress concurred.
