Eighth Grade Social Studies: The Election of 1860 and the Secession Crisis
The presidential election of November 1860 was the catalyst that fractured the American Union, triggering the secession of seven Deep South states and establishing the Confederate States of America before Abraham Lincoln was even inaugurated.
The Fracture of the Democratic Party
As the election year of 1860 arrived, the Democratic Party was the last remaining major national institution holding North and South together. However, when Democratic delegates convened at their national convention in Charleston, South Carolina, in April 1860, the deep sectional animosities that had been festering for a decade tore the party apart.
Northern Democrats, led by frontrunner Stephen A. Douglas, insisted on a platform reaffirming popular sovereignty and the Freeport Doctrine. Southern Democrats, led by radical "Fire-Eater" William Lowndes Yancey of Alabama, refused to accept Douglas. Southern delegates demanded that the party adopt a federal slave code platform plank—an explicit declaration that the United States government had an affirmative constitutional duty to protect slavery in all federal territories, regardless of what territorial settlers or legislatures wanted.
When northern delegates voted down the federal slave code plank, delegates from eight southern states walked out of the convention in protest. Unable to achieve the two-thirds majority required to nominate a candidate, the convention adjourned in chaos.
Two months later, the Democrats reconvened in Baltimore. When northern delegates again refused southern demands, southern delegates walked out a second time. The Democratic Party irrevocably fractured into two separate regional tickets:
- The Northern Democrats: Nominated Stephen A. Douglas of Illinois on a platform of popular sovereignty and fidelity to the Constitution.
- The Southern Democrats: Convened separately in Richmond and nominated sitting Vice President John C. Breckinridge of Kentucky on an unyielding platform demanding federal protection of slavery in all territories and the annexation of slaveholding Cuba.
THE FOUR-WAY CONTEST OF 1860
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| 1. NORTHERN DEMOCRATS: Stephen A. Douglas (Popular Sovereignty) |
| Appealed to northern and border moderates. |
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| 2. SOUTHERN DEMOCRATS: John C. Breckinridge (Federal Slave Code)|
| Championed southern rights and expansion of slavery. |
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| 3. CONSTITUTIONAL UNION: John Bell ("The Union as it is") |
| Moderate border-state Whigs seeking to avoid disunion. |
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| 4. REPUBLICANS: Abraham Lincoln (Free Soil & Internal Improv.) |
| Halt expansion of slavery; protective tariffs; homesteads. |
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The Rise of Lincoln and the Constitutional Union Party
Gathering at the "Wigwam," a massive wooden convention hall in Chicago, Illinois, the Republican Party met with high confidence. Learning from their defeat in 1856, party strategists crafted a broad, moderate platform designed to appeal to diverse northern and western economic interests, going far beyond the single issue of slavery:
- Free Soil: Reaffirmed the total exclusion of slavery from all federal territories.
- Transcontinental Railroad: Pledged federal funding to build a railroad linking the Atlantic and Pacific oceans.
- Homestead Act: Promised 160 acres of free public land in the West to independent family farmers.
- Protective Tariff: Supported high import tariffs to protect northern domestic manufacturing from foreign competition.
- Internal Improvements: Endorsed federal funding for harbor improvements and river navigation.
The leading candidate for the Republican nomination was William H. Seward of New York. However, Seward was viewed by many delegates as too radical due to his past speeches referencing an "irrepressible conflict" and a "higher law" than the Constitution. Astute maneuvering by Illinois campaign managers positioned Abraham Lincoln as the ideal moderate alternative. Lincoln had a compelling life story as a self-made frontier rail-splitter, hailed from the crucial swing state of Illinois, and held moderate positions that could unite conservative former Whigs and radical Free-Soilers. On the third ballot, Lincoln won the Republican nomination.
Meanwhile, a fourth political party emerged: the Constitutional Union Party, composed of conservative former Whigs and Know-Nothings from the upper South and border states. Fearing that a Republican victory or southern radicalism would plunge the nation into civil war, they nominated wealthy Tennessee slaveholder John Bell. Their deliberately vague platform consisted of a single sentence: "The Constitution of the country, the Union of the States, and the Enforcement of the laws," avoiding any direct stance on slavery to preserve national unity.
The Campaign and the Election Results
The 1860 presidential campaign functioned essentially as two distinct regional contests: Lincoln faced Douglas in the northern states, while Breckinridge competed against Bell and Douglas in the southern states. Lincoln's name was not even placed on the ballot in ten southern states.
In an unprecedented move for nineteenth-century presidential candidates, who traditionally remained quietly at home while surrogates campaigned, Stephen A. Douglas embarked on an exhausting national speaking tour. Recognizing by October that Lincoln was poised to win the northern states, Douglas heroically traveled throughout the South, not to seek votes, but to plead with southern audiences to reject secession and preserve the Union, braving eggs, vegetables, and death threats.
On November 6, 1860, the American people voted in record numbers, with voter turnout exceeding 81%:
- Abraham Lincoln: Won 180 electoral votes (an absolute majority of the 303 total) and carried all eighteen northern free states (except for three split votes in New Jersey). However, he won only 39.8% of the popular vote, carrying virtually zero votes in the South.
- John C. Breckinridge: Won 72 electoral votes, sweeping eleven of the fifteen slave states in the Deep and Upper South.
- John Bell: Won 39 electoral votes, carrying the border slave states of Virginia, Kentucky, and Tennessee.
- Stephen A. Douglas: Finished second in the popular vote with nearly thirty percent (1.38 million votes), but carried only Missouri and three electors in New Jersey, winning just 12 electoral votes.
The mathematical reality of the election was chilling to southern leaders: because the North possessed a massive and growing population advantage, Lincoln would have won the Electoral College even if the votes of all three of his opponents had been combined into a single unified candidate. The North could now elect a president completely independently of the South.
THE ELECTORAL MATH OF 1860
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| ABRAHAM LINCOLN (Republican) |
| Electoral: 180 (59.4%) | Popular: 39.8% (Swept Free States) |
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| JOHN C. BRECKINRIDGE (Southern Democrat) |
| Electoral: 72 (23.8%) | Popular: 18.1% (Swept Deep South) |
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| JOHN BELL (Constitutional Union) |
| Electoral: 39 (12.9%) | Popular: 12.6% (VA, KY, TN) |
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| STEPHEN A. DOUGLAS (Northern Democrat) |
| Electoral: 12 (4.0%) | Popular: 29.5% (Finished 2nd in votes) |
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The Secession of the Deep South
For radical southern leaders, Lincoln’s election was the final, intolerable outrage. Throughout the autumn campaign, southern governors and newspapers had explicitly warned that the election of a "Black Republican" committed to halting the expansion of slavery would be an act of war against southern society that justified immediate secession.
South Carolina acted first. On December 20, 1860, a special state convention meeting in Charleston unanimously passed the Ordinance of Secession, repealing South Carolina’s 1788 ratification of the Constitution and declaring that "the union now subsisting between South Carolina and other States, under the name of 'The United States of America,' is hereby dissolved."
In its official Declaration of the Immediate Causes Which Induce and Justify the Secession of South Carolina, the convention explicitly identified the non-enforcement of the Fugitive Slave Act by northern states and the election of a president whose "opinions and purposes are hostile to slavery" as the primary justifications for leaving the Union.
Within six weeks, six other states of the Deep South—where the cotton plantation economy and enslaved population were most heavily concentrated—followed South Carolina's lead:
1. Mississippi (January 9, 1861)
2. Florida (January 10, 1861)
3. Alabama (January 11, 1861)
4. Georgia (January 19, 1861)
5. Louisiana (January 26, 1861)
6. Texas (February 1, 1861)
THE SECESSION OF THE DEEP SOUTH
Dec 20, 1860: SOUTH CAROLINA secedes unanimously
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Jan-Feb 1861: MISSISSIPPI, FLORIDA, ALABAMA, GEORGIA, LOUISIANA, TEXAS
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Feb 4, 1861: MONTGOMERY, ALABAMA CONVENTION
Founding of the CONFEDERATE STATES OF AMERICA; Jefferson Davis President
The Creation of the Confederacy
In early February 1861, delegates from the seven seceded states convened in Montgomery, Alabama, to organize a new sovereign republic: the Confederate States of America (CSA). The delegates drafted a provisional Confederate Constitution modeled heavily upon the United States Constitution, but with critical structural revisions:
- It explicitly protected and guaranteed the right of property in African American slaves in all states and future territories.
- It prohibited the Confederate Congress from ever passing protective import tariffs or funding domestic internal improvements.
- It affirmed the absolute sovereignty of the individual states, granting state legislatures the power to impeach federal officials operating within their borders.
The convention chose Jefferson Davis of Mississippi—a West Point graduate, Mexican-American War hero, former United States senator, and former secretary of war—as the provisional president of the Confederacy, with Alexander H. Stephens of Georgia as vice president. In his famous "Cornerstone Speech" delivered in Savannah, Georgia, on March 21, 1861, Vice President Stephens candidly articulated the founding philosophy of the new Confederate nation:
"Our new government is founded upon exactly the opposite idea; its foundations are laid, its corner-stone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery subordination to the superior race is his natural and normal condition. This, our new government, is the first, in the history of the world, based upon this great physical, philosophical, and moral truth."
The Lame-Duck Crisis and Failed Compromises
During the four agonizing months between Lincoln’s election in November 1860 and his inauguration on March 4, 1861, the nation was paralyzed by a catastrophic leadership vacuum. The outgoing president, James Buchanan, proved completely incapable of decisive action. In his final message to Congress in December 1860, Buchanan adopted a contradictory and paralyzing legal position: he argued that southern states had no constitutional right to secede from the Union, but asserted that the federal government possessed no constitutional power to use military force to prevent them from doing so.
As Buchanan vacillated, seceding state authorities boldly seized federal property within their borders, including customs houses, post offices, mints, arsenals, and military forts, meeting virtually no resistance from federal authorities.
The Crittenden Compromise
In a desperate final bid to avoid civil war, Kentucky Senator John J. Crittenden proposed a package of constitutional amendments known as the Crittenden Compromise. Crittenden’s plan offered major concessions to the South:
1. Re-establishing the historic Missouri Compromise 36°30' line across the continent to the Pacific Ocean, permanently protecting slavery in all federal territories south of that line.
2. An unamendable constitutional amendment forbidding Congress from ever interfering with slavery in the states where it currently existed or in the District of Columbia.
3. Federal compensation to slaveholders whose fugitive slaves were rescued by northern crowds.
While many congressional moderates supported the compromise, President-elect Lincoln firmly rejected it from his home in Springfield, Illinois. Lincoln wrote private letters to Republican leaders instructing them to stand firm against any compromise on the expansion of slavery: "Entertain no compromise on the question of extending slavery. If you do, all our labor is lost... The tug has to come, and better now, than any time hereafter." Lincoln refused to surrender the central principle upon which he had been democratically elected. The Crittenden Compromise collapsed in Congress.
Lincoln's First Inaugural Address
On March 4, 1861, Abraham Lincoln stood on a wooden platform outside the unfinished United States Capitol—its colossal cast-iron dome encased in construction scaffolding—to take the oath of office as the sixteenth president of the United States. Sharpshooters guarded the rooftops, and federal troops lined the streets to protect the new president from assassination.
Lincoln’s First Inaugural Address was a masterclass in constitutional logic, firm resolve, and conciliatory pleading. He began by reassuring the South that he had no legal authority or inclination to interfere with slavery in the states where it existed: "I have no purpose, directly or indirectly, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the States where it exists. I believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so."
However, Lincoln declared unequivocally that the American Union was perpetual and that secession was legally impossible:
- Perpetuity of the Union: The Union was older than the Constitution, dating back to the Articles of Association of 1774, and no government had a legal mechanism for its own destruction. Secession was nothing less than the "essence of anarchy."
- Federal Property: Lincoln vowed that the federal government would "hold, occupy, and possess the property, and places belonging to the government," signaling his intent to retain federal forts in the South.
- The Burden of War: Lincoln placed the moral responsibility for armed conflict entirely upon the southern seceders, stating: "In your hands, my dissatisfied fellow-countrymen, and not in mine, is the momentous issue of civil war. The government will not assail you. You can have no conflict without being yourselves the aggressors."
Lincoln concluded his address with an immortal appeal to common heritage and shared history:
"I am loath to close. We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained, it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battle-field, and patriot grave, to every living heart and hearthstone, all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature."
Lincoln’s eloquent words could not bridge the chasm. In Charleston Harbor, South Carolina, a small federal garrison at Fort Sumter was running out of food, setting the stage for the opening bombardment of the bloodiest war in American history.
Chapter Exercises
Exercise 1: Explain the ideological disagreements that caused the Democratic Party to fracture into two separate regional tickets during their national conventions in 1860.
Exercise 2: Analyze the political platform crafted by the Republican Party in 1860, explaining how it appealed to diverse northern economic interests beyond the issue of slavery.
Exercise 3: Describe the four-way race of the 1860 presidential election and explain how the demographic and electoral realities allowed Abraham Lincoln to win the presidency without southern support.
Exercise 4: Outline the primary justifications given by South Carolina and other Deep South states for seceding from the Union, and analyze Vice President Alexander Stephens's "Cornerstone Speech."
Exercise 5: Summarize the key arguments made by Abraham Lincoln in his First Inaugural Address regarding the perpetuity of the Union, federal property, and the responsibility for initiating war.
Solutions and Explanations
Solution 1: The Democratic Party fractured over the legal status of slavery in the federal territories. Northern Democrats supported Stephen A. Douglas and popular sovereignty, which allowed territorial voters to decide the issue. Southern Democrats, led by radical Fire-Eaters, demanded an explicit federal slave code guaranteeing federal protection for slavery in all territories. When northern delegates rejected this plank at the Charleston convention, southern delegates walked out, ultimately resulting in Northern Democrats nominating Douglas and Southern Democrats nominating John C. Breckinridge.
Solution 2: The Republican platform broadened its appeal to northern and western voters by combining Free Soil (halting the spread of slavery) with popular economic proposals: a protective tariff to support northern manufacturing, a Homestead Act offering free 160-acre western land grants to independent farmers, federal funding for a transcontinental railroad, and river/harbor internal improvements. This multi-faceted economic platform united industrial workers, commercial interests, and Midwestern farmers behind the Republican ticket.
Solution 3: In the four-way race, Lincoln faced Douglas in the North, while Breckinridge, Bell, and Douglas competed in the South. Lincoln carried eighteen northern free states, winning an absolute majority of 180 electoral votes despite winning only 39.8% of the popular vote and receiving virtually no votes in the South. Because the North had a vastly larger population, Lincoln would have won the Electoral College even if his three opponents had combined their votes, demonstrating that the North no longer required southern support to elect a president.
Solution 4: South Carolina and the Deep South justified secession by citing northern non-enforcement of the Fugitive Slave Act, the passage of state Personal Liberty Laws, and the election of a Republican president hostile to slavery. In his "Cornerstone Speech," Confederate Vice President Alexander Stephens stated that the Confederacy was built on the core truth that African Americans were racially inferior to white people and that slavery was their natural condition, declaring that racial hierarchy was the "cornerstone" of their new government.
Solution 5: In his First Inaugural Address, Lincoln asserted that the American Union was perpetual and older than the Constitution, making secession legally impossible and an act of anarchy. He vowed to "hold, occupy, and possess" all federal properties, including military forts in the South. Finally, Lincoln placed the moral burden of war entirely upon the South, declaring that the federal government would not initiate violence, leaving the issue of armed conflict in the hands of the seceders.