Demonstrates the crucial role that the Constitution played in the coming of the Civil War.

Michael F. Conlin is Professor of History at Eastern Washington University and author of One Nation Divided by Slavery: Remembering the American Revolution while Marching toward the Civil War (2015).

1. The original intent of the slaveholding founders; 2. Two constitutional wrongs did not guarantee a constitutional right; 3. The tyranny of the Northern majority; 4. The spirit of 1787; 5. The constitutional right of secession; Epilogue: the Founders' constitution no more.