Where does it say in the Constitution as it existed in 1861 that individual states don’t have a right to succeed from the Union?
It doesn’t have to. Any American citizen who engages in active warfare against his country is a traitor by definition. And I don’t buy the noble states rights cause either. Remove slavery from the equation and the war never happens. Anyone who thinks otherwise is either lying or delusional. So i’m supposed to be sad that a pro-slavery traitor died and think he was a good man. Not a chance.
The states that ratified the Constitution, in so ratifying it, acknowledged Article VI, paragraph 2:
This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding.
If the individual states are bound by the Constitution as the supreme law of the land, they cannot unilaterally abolish it within their borders and replace on their own authority.
They have ceded that supreme legal authority to the United States through ratification.
I'm not the grammar and spelling police, but to quiet those who are, the word is secede
Article I, Section 10. and Article. VI. They wrote up that handy-dandy stuff in the Consitution saying states are "BOUND by oath to support THIS Constitution" and that individual states "shall NOT enter into any Agreement or Compact with another State, or with a foreign Power" because they had this little pre-Constitution era problem called "Shays Rebellion", where the failed "Articles of Confederation" allowed the states to do whatever the hell they wanted.
American history 101, Freshman year.