Was the secession of the Confederate states illegal?

The secession of the Confederate states was like leaving a group game without asking permission, it wasn’t completely illegal, but it wasn’t officially allowed either.

Secession means a state or group decides to leave a bigger group. In this case, some Southern states wanted to leave the United States because they disagreed about slavery and how the country should be run.

Imagine you're in a classroom with your friends, and everyone agrees on the rules of a game. But one day, a few kids decide they want to start their own game with different rules, without asking the teacher or the rest of the class. That’s kind of what happened with the Confederate states.

The United States had a rule that said you couldn’t just leave unless the whole country agreed. But the Southern states didn’t wait for permission; they left anyway, like kids starting their own game in the middle of the classroom.

So, it wasn’t illegal, no one put them in time-out, but it was not officially allowed, which made the bigger group (the United States) decide to stop them from leaving by force.