The issue of slavery was debated and fought over for many years before the election of 1860. It was only until Lincoln became president that sparked the southern states to secede, which led to the Civil War. Proof of this is found in the many Declaration of Secession documents produced by each state that left the union. This is basically a document explaining why they left the United States to form the Confederate States of America (CSA) aka the Confederacy.
In modern times, some people mistakenly claim that the Civil War wasn't over slavery but rather states' rights. This is simply false. The documents I mentioned prove that slavery was the core issue. More proof is the various states having issues with the fugitive slave act, in that the northern states didn't really adhere to the law to the level of the southern states' liking. I guess you could argue that states' rights were involved, but specifically the south fought to have the right to own slaves. In short, it's all about getting the correct context. Expanding that context, simply look at the decades preceding the war and notice all of the tension involving whether a new state was a free state vs a slave state.
Roger Williams was expelled from Massachusetts for being " a rebel" for his new ideas and later founded the state of Rhode Island advocating the ideals of the separation of church and state.
Before the Reformation, the dominant force in European life was the Catholic Church, and it was precisely because of this dominating force that the Protestant Reformation became a strong movement.
Answer: The Treaty of Versailles might have caused the Great Depression. it put small states on Germany's borders, in eastern and central Europe. It eliminated Russia as a direct enemy of Germany, at least in the 1920s, and it removed Russia as an ally of France.
