It depends on your definition of "secession".
Some people say our Founders "seceded" first from Britain in 1776 and again from the Articles of Confederation in 1788.
So, if you define those as "secession" and consider our Founders' words on related topics (i.e., "disunion"), then clearly they considered it legitimate & acceptable under two, and only two, circumstances:
Secession outside those two conditions was disunion "at pleasure" which our Founders considered little more than treason & rebellion which they strongly opposed.
For examples consider President Jefferson's response to Vice President Aaron Burr's attempted secession in 1807 and President Washington's response to the Whiskey Rebellion of 1791.
pierrem15: "That said, it is also clear that the Republican Party platform, which embraced abolition, embraced an end for which there was no Constitutional means."
No, the 1860 Republican platform did not call for nation-wide abolition, far from it.
It did call for letting territories themselves vote on whether to be free or slave, and that was enough restriction on slavery to drive Deep South Fire Eaters to declare secession.
Yes, allowing territories to vote themselves whether to be free or slave was a new idea, but hardly unconstitutional.
pierrem15: "The only way the Federal government could end slavery would have been through abusive means (such as a tariff on cotton exports) intended to bankrupt the plantation system or through the outright usurpation of unconstitutional powers."
You know, of course, there never was a tariff on exports of any kind, nor was any ever proposed.
But it's astonishing how often you Lost Causers bring up that canard.
Can anyone explain why?
pierrem15: "Given Lincoln's election, the South had quite
legitimate fears about such a process of usurpation."
Well... there's no doubt Deep South Fire Eaters' fears were real, but they were hardly legitimate given the actual facts.
What those fears truly were is self serving propaganda, flames fanned to justify actions Fire Eaters had pushed for years before there were any Republicans -- secession.
Republican anti-slavery views just made it easier for Fire Eaters to sell what they wanted anyway.
pierrem15: "The war that followed was a tragedy precisely because in many (if different) respects, both sides were right."
Poor Southern farmers who owned no slaves but served their Confederacy loyally certainly cannot be blamed for the actions of their slavocratic leaders.
But leaders who start a war they cannot win are universally judged foolish and, well, wicked.
8. That the normal condition of all the territory of the United States is that of freedom: That, as our Republican fathers, when they had abolished slavery in all our national territory, ordained that "no persons should be deprived of life, liberty or property without due process of law," it becomes our duty, by legislation, whenever such legislation is necessary, to maintain this provision of the Constitution against all attempts to violate it; and we deny the authority of Congress, of a territorial legislature, or of any individuals, to give legal existence to slavery in any territory of the United States.
Pretty bold statement, don't you think? And if such a party should prevent the introduction of slavery into any new territories, then the South would have found itself in a permanent minority in the Senate due to the entrance of more free states, and the House due to immigration to the North.
The Colonies prior to 1776 had used the original colonial charters to create governments largely free from British interference, and did not consent to the British re-interpretation of the colonial arrangement and so chose to secede and form and independent state.
Some Southern states looked at the inexorable political domination of the free states and decided to secede before any "long train of abuses" was commenced. Is that a fault, or simply poor political judgment?
Regarding tariffs, I was mistaken and you are right. However, you can just call it an excise tax and then it's legal. We now know very well how the Federal government can strangle the economic base of the political opponents of the governing party. Why would the South decide to stick around when it was clear that its economic and political interests would always be subordinated to those of its opponents?
It's one thing to be an ephemeral minority, to rule and be ruled in turn. It's quite another to face the prospect of becoming a permanent political minority.
Point of order. The Declaration does not say abuses are necessary for independence. It merely lists them in an effort to justify what they were doing, but the Declaration says the right is inherent. This is the key sentence.
That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.
The key requirement for governmental legitimacy is "consent of the governed."
If a government no longer has that consent, the people have a right to abolish it. The reasons why the people no longer consent to it are irrelevant. What people consider Usurpations and Abuses are in the eyes of the beholder, meaning their own eyes.