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lentulusgracchus: "What do you call waiting for Congress to go home, then launching a major war that ends with the South in ashes?"

I'd call that a Neo-Confederate myth, since it's not what happened in real history.
In real history, Congress served its normal session from March 4 until March 28 and then adjourned as usual.

But Lincoln's deadline for action on Fort Sumter -- as per Major Anderson's reports -- was April 15, and Lincoln spent that time trying to find some peaceful solution.
For example, even as late as April 4, Lincoln again offered to trade Fort Sumter for a promise of Virginia not declaring secession -- an offer again rejected by Virginia's Unionist leadership.

And in the end, Lincoln never "launched a major war" until after the Confederacy had provoked, started and formally declared war on the United States, on May 6, 1861.

In his response to the Confederacy's assault on Fort Sumter, Lincoln called for a highly unusual special secession of Congress, to begin July 4, in which session Congress approved everything Lincoln had done.

lentulusgracchus: "In 1870, 20% of the Mississippi state budget went for prostheses for war veterans.
In what skittles-and-unicorns sense is that not 'expansion of federal powers'? "

The US Constitution provides for the Federal Government to repel invasions and suppress rebellions.
So no expansion of constitutionally delegated authority was necessary to defeat a Confederate military power, after it had launched and declared major war on the United States.