The thing that is notable is that the Civil War did fundamentally change the political compact that created the US. The is nothing that happened prior to 1792 that would suggest that the Union couldn't dissolve as peaceably as it had formed. That 'decision' only came in 1861 when Lincoln and the north decided they would not tolerate an independent slave nation on the southern border. It was only that decision - to prosecute the war rather than let the South secede, that turned the US into the unitary state it is today and established the absolute primacy of the Federal government. So in a way, the Civil War was fought over state's rights, but not in the way it's framed in the South. The more accurate reading is that it was the exact intention of *north* to establish that states did not have the right to defy the federal government or leave the union. The South was fighting for Slavery, the North was fighting to establish the ultimate authority of the federal government over any state's right as the vehicle to end slavery, i.e. against State's rights.