Please remember the South started the War.  To be sure, slavery was going to end...no doubt about that.  The slave-owning states could have negotiated a "graceful" end of slavery, likely including compensation for emancipated slaves. They chose, instead, to secede from the United States.  Those, using your term "raring to go to war" were the Southern leaders who refused to accept that slavery was coming to an end.  "States rights" was directly relevant to their assertion that the US government had no power to end slavery if the State wished to continue it.  The same argument was used to oppose the Civil Rights movement and seek to continue second-class citizenship for African-Americans.....segregated schools, segregated neighborhoods, "off-limits" places of business, "back of the bus"....."whites only" drinking fountains...etc.  Guess what....."states' rights" do NOT supercede HUMAN RIGHTS.  This was true at the time of the C.W; during the Civil Rights Movement....and today.  Gary Crum