You have a double-standard on the legitimacy of puppet governments. MO and KY were both border states with split populations. Tell me, did the CSA also have puppet governments for NY and VT? No they didn't.
The fundamental point was that the secession of West Virginia was exactly the same issue of self-determination as the secession of the CSA. On the issue of self-determination alone, you cannot logically reject one and accept the other, nor accept one and reject the other. There must be other elements brought into the discussion to make a differentiation.
The fact that Lincoln readily accepted the concept of WV put the lie to the position that the North was fighting a war based on the position that former bonds were inseparable.
As for the abolitionists, they had a Holy War against slavery (not a bad thing to have a Holy War against). No, the priority was not war with the South, but they were certainly ready to go that route. The problem for them was that there was no popular support for it, which led to actions like John Brown's attempt at subversion. Even well into the war, freeing the slaves was not an effective motivator to get young northern men to die by the thousands.
Why did Lincoln and his supporters consider it worth war to make half the country, who overwhelmingly wished to split bonds, submit to federal control? That is the key question. If it was because they felt a moral imperative to end slavery, then that is understandable and at least defensible; however, this issue of preserving the union is highly questionable. If you have to kill and crush a state to make it submit to your union, it is obviously a one-sided benefit. Much the same as the difference between the union of marriage and rape.
Why did Lincoln reject negotiating with the the secessionist states? When half the population of a country which is ostensibly of, for, and by the people have a huge issue with the other half, negotiating would seem reasonable.
What would the South have wanted? Likely Constitutional assurances on slavery and an end to restrictions on slavery in the new territories. I think Lincoln suspected that if this was presented as the key to preserving the union, that most northern states would accept it, as an alternative to war. Lincoln wasn't going to allow that to happen.
Of course, the North could have proffered to have a national solution to slavery, say a 10-20 year plan to purchase, apprentice, and free slaves. That was a popular notion, and the cost certainly would have been less than the war. It was a common notion because it is exactly what the British had done. The South might have rejected it, but it would have been worth exploring.
So why not negotiate? Likely because Lincoln and his supporters saw a need to strike while the iron was hot, the country was agitated, and not risk losing a chance to end slavery, whatever the means. But that's not what he sold to the Northern people who would do the dying.
Thus, I return to my original point. The North fought to do a good thing (end slavery) under the false and flawed pretense of preserving the union, while the South fought to do a bad thing (keep/expand slavery) under the false, but morally correct, pretense of self-determination. Although other lesser issues did exist, slavery was the only issue that drove the South to secede and the North to make war.
So the "single standard" is whatever the Confederacy wanted? They wanted all the slave states and were entitled to them, but because they didn't set up puppet regimes for free states, the rest of the country should have been grateful and just given them whatever they wanted?
The fundamental point was that the secession of West Virginia was exactly the same issue of self-determination as the secession of the CSA. On the issue of self-determination alone, you cannot logically reject one and accept the other, nor accept one and reject the other. There must be other elements brought into the discussion to make a differentiation.
West Virginia became a state following the constitutional procedure for admitting new states. You can argue that what happened was illegitimate, because the people who were shooting at us weren't given a veto over it, but the process is written in black and white in the constitution. It wasn't a matter of some abstract right to self-determination to be exercised in spite of the provisions of the constitution. "Self-determination" doesn't automatically trump the rule of law or the Constitution.
Why did Lincoln and his supporters consider it worth war to make half the country, who overwhelmingly wished to split bonds, submit to federal control?
If it really was a matter of half the country wanting to leave, Lincoln wouldn't have won the war or even been elected. By voters or population it was considerably less than half. That ought to have inspired caution in the secessionist leaders, rather than recklessness.
If you have to kill and crush a state to make it submit to your union, it is obviously a one-sided benefit. Much the same as the difference between the union of marriage and rape.
Bringing up rape in this context is like bringing up Hitler. It calls into question just how good your arguments really are (as well as your sense of good taste).
But what the Unionists were concerned about was what they regarded as the rule of law and constitutional procedure. To that we can add the sense of nationhood and anger at the insult to the flag.
Given the ambiguities involved, the may have been wrong about what the rule of law required, but their case wasn't any worse than that of the secessionists. The other, more emotional matters don't have as much appeal today (at least until such emotions flare up again), but they were taken very seriously by the 19th century.
To say that the unionists didn't have a case apart from slavery is to stack the deck by simply ignoring such arguments as they did have and make.
Of course, the North could have proffered to have a national solution to slavery, say a 10-20 year plan to purchase, apprentice, and free slaves. That was a popular notion, and the cost certainly would have been less than the war. It was a common notion because it is exactly what the British had done. The South might have rejected it, but it would have been worth exploring.
It was not a popular notion. Not in the slave states, where the matter couldn't even be discussed, and probably not in the country as a whole. There was the matter of cost and the matter of what would happen to the freedmen, what rights and opportunities would be given to the former slaves.
But beyond all that, compensated emancipation -- the prospect of an end to slavery -- wasn't a measure that would appease the secessionists, but rather one that would inflame them. Talk about an end to slavery in anything other than the remote fullness of time was bound to be perceived as a threat to plantation interests and would incense many slave-owners.
Others, convinced the boom in cotton prices would continue would simply dismiss such a proposal. Such a proposal would also likely cost the government support in the Border States and the southern Midwest.
So why not negotiate? Likely because Lincoln and his supporters saw a need to strike while the iron was hot, the country was agitated, and not risk losing a chance to end slavery, whatever the means. But that's not what he sold to the Northern people who would do the dying.
I'd say it was Davis who was "striking while the iron was hot" -- creating a crisis to whip up support for secession. As for Lincoln, any US president wants to save face. No president wants to be seen as the one who let the country fall to pieces on his watch. So most presidents would not simply collapse before separatist demands. The same goes for most leaders of most countries around the world -- very much including democratically elected leaders.
So if you are leading a separationist movement and want to be successful, you recognize that. You try to avoid pushing your would-be former government's back to the wall. You recognize that what's at stake isn't just your own wants and wishes.
But I suspect that secessionist leaders then and their defenders now are more into emotionalism than in actually achieving their goals through prudent and responsible action.
http://www.amazon.com/Disease-Public-Mind-Understanding-Fought/dp/0306821265
“By the time John Brown hung from the gallows for his crimes at Harper’s Ferry, Northern abolitionists had made him a “holy martyr” in their campaign against Southern slave owners. This Northern hatred for Southerners long predated their objections to slavery. They were convinced that New England, whose spokesmen had begun the American Revolution, should have been the leader of the new nation. Instead, they had been displaced by Southern “slavocrats” like Thomas Jefferson. This malevolent envy exacerbated the South’s greatest fear: a race war. Jefferson’s cry, “We are truly to be pitied,” summed up their dread. For decades, extremists in both regions flung insults and threats, creating intractable enmities. By 1861, only a civil war that would kill a million men could save the Union.”