The American Civil War Could Have Been Avoided

In the election of 1861 Lincoln got only 40% of the vote.
So how did he win the election ??
The Democrats won 50% of the votes.
So they would have won,
except that Breckenridge insisted on running against Senator Stephen Douglas.
Thus the Democratic vote was split:
30% for Douglas; 20% for Breckenridge.
 
If Breckenridge hadn't played the spoiler,
if he had let Douglas run as the only Democrat,
Douglas would have won 50% to Lincoln's 40%.
So Douglas would have become president.
So the South wouldn't have seceded.
So the Civil War would not have taken place.
 
So the obvious question is,  
Why did Breckenridge run ??
What was he thinking ??
 
Chief Justice of the Supreme Court Taney
had just handed down the Dred Scott decision of 1859.
In which he struck down all the Congressional deals made on slavery over the past 40 years!!
Such as the Missouri Compromise of 1820 and the Compromise of 1850.
Those deals had restricted the spread of slavery to areas below the Mason-Dixon Line, with certain exceptions.
 
Taney held that slaves were property  
-  which knows no boundaries  --  and as such were legal in every state.
His ruling was the epitomy of rigid cockiness.
 
Stephen Douglas claimed that Taney had gone too far. He held that states had the right to vote on slavery,  
choosing to be either slave states or free states.
This slightly reasonable position was attacked by Breckenridge as weak, not zealous enuff.
Breckenridge defended Taney.
If Taney hadn't taken such an uncompromising position,  
Breckenridge would not been able to denounce Douglas's position.
 
You wouldn't think that Douglas's slight deviation from Taney's position would equate with political heresy.
But that's what it was to the "fire-eaters"  -- pro-slavery fanatics like Breckenridge.
He took his cue from Taney: no compromise.

So you see that the KKK's partnering with the neo-Nazis today didn't begin only recently.
Taney and Breckenridge were, by their intransigence, forerunners of that sort of strict madness.