State's rights were an issue LONG before Lincoln came to office.
Andrew Jackson, a southerner, told South Carolina in no uncertain terms that if they attempted to suceed in the 1820s he would personally lead the army and pull them back into the Union.
By the time that Lincoln came into office, almost all, if not all, of the states rights issues that had been raised in the 1820s through 1840s, including the issues of tariffs, had been resolved. By the time of the Civil War, states rights was a throwback issue that was dusted off to give more creedence to secession.
Lincoln also made it very clear that he wanted to work with the Southern states to ensure preservation of the Union. Before he was even inaugurated, though, states started seceeding, so Lincoln certainly can't be blamed for that.
Many of the issues that the southern states were screaming about were issues that they had fully accepted in the numerous compromises that had been enacted through the first half of the 1800s.
It's also very hard to call Lincoln a dictator, or akin to a dictator, when the actions that he took largely had the blessing of the Congress.
Yes, Lincoln greatly expanded the power of the Federal government, but why, exactly, was that? Because the Southern states seceeded. No secession, more Congressional compromise between Northern and Southern states, no greatly increased power of the Federal government.
I've read a lot of history that bitches, whines, and moans about how that nasty, big bully the industrialized North was pushing the South around. Whose fault, ultimately, is that? The North's? Nope, the Southern planter aristocracy's. They were the people with the money in the South, and they intentionally rejected large-scale industrialization in the South of the kind that would have given the region far greater influence, wealth, and power.