Thus the election of 1860 had four candidates, each appealing to the voters as the only true defender of the Union. The Democrats spent a great deal of effort attacking each other. The well-financed Republicans spent their money on large and enthusiastic demonstrations on behalf of their candidate. This left Lincoln to say very little at all, in spite of Southern Democrats decrying Lincoln as an enemy of the South. At this time, Lincoln might have been able to calm fears and explain his views, but he decided not to, thinking that the South would not believe anything he said. At any rate, the Republican strategists had written off the South and concentrated on the populous states in the Midwest where the electoral votes were concentrated. Of course, presidents are not elected by popular votes (individual votes cast by citizens), but electoral votes.
The Republican strategy worked. Lincoln won every state in the North except New Jersey. Oregon and California joined to give the Republicans 180 electoral votes and the presidency. Breckinridge won most of the South with 72 electoral votes. Bell captured 39 electoral votes with Tennessee, Kentucky, and Virginia. Douglas took 12 electoral votes in two states, New Jersey and Missouri. Although the aggregate popular vote didn’t count, a breakdown of these votes is instructive. The three other candidates received 1 million more popular votes than Lincoln did. In the popular vote, interestingly, Lincoln received no votes at all in ten Southern states. In the rest of the South, he had a negligible tally. Another interesting fact emerges about Southern voting. The popular vote in the South was split between the three other candidates, indicating no agreement about the future of the nation, except to prevent Lincoln’s election.
One of the interesting quirks of democracy that fascinates and puzzles the nondemocratic world is the way that the voters whose candidate does not win accept the judgment of the majority, allowing the business of the nation to go on. In reality this unstated agreement is a very fragile condition, which forms the base of the democratic process. In November 1860, that base was shattered. For the first time in American history, the voters of the losing party refused to accept or abide by the results of an election.
The South’s view of the election
Here’s how the South analyzed the results of the election. The Republicans won 180 electoral votes. This meant that even if only one candidate had opposed Lincoln, with the entire South united in support, Lincoln would still have won the election. The South simply lacked the electoral votes to offset the advantage of the Northern states.
Clearly, Southern political power had disappeared, and the Republican Party now could dominate the House and the presidency at will. There would be no congressional guarantees of slavery or protection of Southern rights coming from a House of Representatives dominated by the North. Without any words of conciliation coming from the Republicans, many Southerners in the cotton South feared the worst and began to contemplate the last option they believed they had left — leaving the Union.
Chapter 3
Secession and War: 1860–1861
IN THIS CHAPTER
After the election of 1860, only a few Southern states took the drastic step of secession. The actions of James Buchanan, the outgoing president, and Abraham Lincoln, the incoming president, would determine whether other Southern states would follow. With very few options and time running out, both men sought to satisfy two conflicting conditions at the same time — to assert the rights of the United States and to avoid war.
On the other side, the seceded states created the Confederate States of America. Although wanting to leave the Union peacefully, the new president of the Confederate States of America, Jefferson Davis, was not afraid of fighting for his new nation’s independence. For both the United States and the Confederate States of America, Fort Sumter became the dominant symbol of each nation’s prideful determination not to back down.
The First Secession: South Carolina and the Lower South
On December 20, 1860, 169 delegates of the state of South Carolina met in Charleston to consider leaving the Union. The convention was organized to mimic the first state convention that assembled for voting to join the United States in 1788. The logic of secession went like this: Each state was sovereign after independence from Great Britain. In 1788, the states entered into a federal union under the Constitution voluntarily. The Constitution was thus a compact, an agreement of sovereign, independent, and self-governing states allowing the central government to have specific powers as outlined in the Constitution. According to the Tenth Amendment, all other power resided with the states. Therefore, any state, if it so desired, could voluntarily leave the Union (secede) and could become a sovereign state again. This was not a rebellion, the South Carolina delegates insisted, but a legal act.
Given the climate after the election of 1860, and the growing fear of what the Republican Party would do to the South after taking control of the government in March when the new president was inaugurated, South Carolina took the first drastic step to dissolve its fraternal bonds with the United States. To the surprise of many Southerners, there was no reaction. After all of the emotionalism, the threats, and the sense of high purpose enmeshed in their world-shaking event, nothing happened. The people of South Carolina must have felt a bit sheepish and uneasy in the roaring silence coming from the federal government. Congress, with its members divided along sectional lines, could take little action, even if it wanted to and President Buchanan had no interest in making waves at the moment. The new citizens of South Carolina also felt a bit lost, lacking any means whatsoever to function independently. The newly declared nation awaited help from her sister states in the lower South, or some indication from Washington. That help came quickly and raised morale higher. Mississippi voted on January 9, 1861, to secede. Two more days passed with two more states, Florida and Alabama, leaving the Union. By the first of February, Georgia, Louisiana, and Texas had also voted themselves out. These states of the lower South had the most to lose from a national government controlled (probably permanently) by Republicans hostile to slavery and condemning the institution to a slow death, which meant eventual economic ruin and social chaos.
The rationale for secession can be summed up in one sentence taken from the Mississippi ordinance of secession: “Our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery — the greatest material interest of the world.” The key words here are “material interest.” Slavery was the basis of the cotton economy, the greatest generator of wealth in the world. These seven states were not willing to risk their wealth, economic security, and social dominance on the Republican-dominated government. This material interest is highlighted by the fact that whites in these states made up only 32% of the South’s total population. Slaves in these states made up 47% of the total slave population. In fact, in Mississippi and South Carolina (the first two states to secede) the enslaved population actually exceeded the white population.
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