What was why the reason the south secede?

Answer 1

The South (a.k.a the Confederacy) seceded from the North (a.k.a. Union) over the issue of slavery. Many southerners and northerners in the early 1800s were becoming paranoid over the issue of expanding slavery into the West. The South believed that the North was conspiring to end slavery all over the US; while the North believed that, the South was conspiring to expand slavery all over the nation (including in Northeastern states). Many northern farmers despised slavery from an economical standpoint; they realized the southern plantation owners could sell their goods cheaper because of slave labor. The South believed that slavery was a way of life and if they gave it up their whole economy and society would collapse. Poor southerners (those who couldn't afford slaves) saw slavery as a way to get rich and wanted slavery to remain legal. People who advocated the end of slavery were called abolitionists, and sometimes they were former slaves who now lived outside of the South (like Fredrick Douglass). Some abolitionists were opposed to slavery because of moral and religious views (like the Quakers and John Brown), while many more were opposed to it through economic reasons; while, the South used racism, economics, historical examples (like ancient Rome and Greece which was built on slave labor), and religion to justify slavery. After the war and to the present some people would argue that the American Civil War was about state rights'.

Sources:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Origins_of_the_American_Civil_War#Religious_conflict_over_the_slavery_question

Zinn, Howard (2003). A People's History of the United States: 1493 to Present. HarperCollins.