Page:Confederate Military History - 1899 - Volume 1.djvu/352

314 the influence and interest of that section were felt to be involved.

The great campaign speech of Mr. Seward, August 14, 1860, designed to be representative of the policy of the new party, excited the fears of the Southern people, and, as the information reached them through the Northern papers of the progress of the canvass, their despair of the election increased. Mr. Toombs, in repeating the idea that we may have to give up constitutional safeguards in order to save the government, declared that &quot;Our greatest danger today is that the Union will survive the Constitution.&quot; Mr. Davis and Mr. Stephens reiterated the warnings which were being given by Northern states men that sectional success portended the separation of North and South. Mr. Banks in answer had said, &quot;Let the Union slide&quot;; Mr. Greeley, that &quot;the South cannot be kicked out&quot;; while public speakers favoring the new party made a jest of the so-called threat of disunion. During the whole term of this contest Mr. Lincoln’s personality was not in issue. His character was above reproach, and, while his course had been partisan and free soil, it was never vindictive. The South would have chosen him in a personal contest against Seward, Giddings, Banks, Hale, Stevens, and a hundred others. It was not Mr. Lincoln s election, but the domination of one area in the Union over all the Union, that the South regarded as a just cause for seeking a division of the United States.

In October it [became apparent that the divided conservatives would be beaten. Attempts made too late to organize a fusion unfortunately failed, and the spirit of secession advanced rapidly throughout the South. It was at first vague, somewhat irresolute, and always conditional. But the signs of its presence became clear enough before the election in November to produce uneasiness throughout the North yet nothing more. General Scott, being in chief command of the army and looking at the question from the military point of view,