So true. That, coupled with the fact that Northern textile mills and shipping would be worth little without cotton, made the war a necessity for the North.
I had never contemplated this angle until this last month or so, but the more I consider it, the more sense it makes to me. Lincoln was a masterful politician and new how to stir a crowd into supporting him.
He wouldn't have been able to fight it if he had made the war about lost New England income.
I'm thinking it might be a worthwhile effort to compile evidence to either prove or disprove this idea.