Samuel Mitcham on when "all about slavery" became the official narrative of the Civil War

From the 1870s to the late 1950s, there was an unofficial truce between the North and South.  Each side recognized and saluted the courage of the other; it was conceded that the North fought to preserve the Union and because Old Glory had been fired on, and the Southerner fought for liberty and to defend his home; the two great heroes of the war were Abraham Lincoln and Robert E. Lee; and the South admitted that slavery was wrong but never conceded that it was cruel.

Around 1960, the Democratic Party—led by Lyndon B. Johnson—advanced the modern incarnation of identity politics.  It worked very well for them.  In the election of 1956, 75% of African-Americans voted Republican.  By 1964, more than 90% of them voted Democrat, and they have been doing so until 2020.  As part of their effort to control and manipulate the black vote, the Leftists and their myrmidons advanced the myth that the Civil War was all about slavery.  It wasn’t.  It was, in my opinion, about money, more than anything else.

~ Samuel W. Mitcham, Jr., "Why the Civil War Wasn't About Slavery," LewRockwell.com, July 15, 2020