Oh my, well you did the experiment and it seems pretty conclusive. I’m expecting your transmission will soon be laying on the shop floor for a visual inspection soon.
Okay.
Flush the clutch system of all the DOT4 hydraulic fluid, and replace it with DOT3.
And cross your fingers.
Tester
The specs for that vehicle I think call for DOT 3, but whether or not DOT 4 is automatically compatible, don’t know. Tester’s idea seems a practical one in any event.
I don’t think its a hydraulic issue, I think it is mechanical. The mating is good, now I would suspect that it has the wrong clutch plate. It may fit, but the frictions surfaces may not be the correct thickness or maybe even the plate is installed in the wrong direction. Is this clutch kit aftermarket?
If you have access to the factory service manual, there should be specs on the plate to flywheel/pressure plate when the clutch pedal is depressed. Then you could put it up on your ramps and remove the inspection plate, have someone depress the clutch pedal and measure the clearance.
You could also rotate the engine and look for anything that might have gotten stuck between the clutch plate and the flywheel/pressure plate.
Slave cylinder is inside the bell housing. No fluid on ground.
The bell housing is not sealed and most have a drain port at the bottom. So if the slave cylinder leaks, there will be fluid on the ground.
Sorry all- I forgot to update. The finger springs failed.
The previous mechanic was kind enough to drop (and crack) my starter and cross the threads on four bolts.
I’m going to assume it failed due to a shitty install.
Thanks for the update OP. You’d thnk the starter is pretty much independent of the clutch and transmission, but it sounds from what you say a problematic starter install can cause a lot of grief. It must be some kind of record to get all four bolts holding the starter cross-threaded. As a diy’er when I install a replacement starter one thing I always do as a preliminary is make sure the bolts will thread easily into their holes without complaint, before I even attempt to actually install the starter. I discovered I had a bent bolt that way one time. And I’ve discovered that the threads in the replacement starter ass’y needed some cleaning and reaming, presumably b/c a coating of some kind got applied to the case after the threads were tapped. Such a diversion takes time though, and for shops they probably can’t justify being quite that careful.
Anyway, glad you are back on the road with a smooth shifting car 
I believe they cross threaded two in the bell housing and two in the starter (and dropped and cracked the starter).
I think it was an all around bad install- the starter was just icing on the cake.