Within the pre-Civil War South, there was a variety of views on why or how the South should secede from the Union. Not every southerner was pro immediate secession or even pro-secession at all. For the most part, the differences in pro-secession views were the result of “tactics and timing, not goals”[1] because the idea of secession was largely agreed upon, but the conditions under which secession should take place was under debate. On polar extreme ends were the fire-eaters and unconditional unionists. Making up all of the middle views was a varying group known as cooperationists who were then subdivided into three categories: cooperative secessionists, ultimatumists, and conditional unionists.

The fire-eaters were fervent secessionists who wanted to move quickly and immediately to take the South out of the Union even if it meant taking them out on a state-by-state basis. One at a time, the states would leave the Union and join in a new Southern union, the Confederacy. This group felt that the North had already infringed too grievously on the rights of the South through such things as their lack in enforcing slave laws and the election of Lincoln. Conversely, the unconditional unionists were people who felt that under no condition should the South leave the Union. These were people who believed they had the most to lose from secession, or were members of the small farmer class who had little to gain from secession and no interest in it.[2]

The three subgroups of cooperationists were differentiated by the factors that they believed should be in place before secession or to cause secession. Cooperative secessionists were a group comprised of men who believed that the South should secede from the Union, but they did not endorse the state-by-state method of secession. Instead, they felt that the South had to act as a cohesive unit of states in order to present a serious and firm front. Ultimatumists wanted to make a list of demands, a list of ultimatums, which the Lincoln administration would have to adhere to. If the Northern Republicans in power didn’t follow through with the conditions of the ultimatum, the South would secede from the Union. The last group of cooperationists, the conditional unionists, felt that the South should stay in the Union and give the new president and his administration a chance to prove that they were not a threat to Southern interests and the Southern way of life. If they did breech the trust of the southerners, the South would then secede. However, where were some conditional unionists that felt that the Republicans had already breeched this trust with the election of Lincoln as president, as well as some cooperationists who said that they were still cooperationists, just with the new confederation of southern states and no longer the Union.[3]

The feelings about secession were mixed and varied, ranging from those who wanted it unconditionally to those who opposed secession with just as much fervor. The middle groups of cooperationists had numerous views on how the south should secede, but secession was largely received among southerners who wanted a way to end anxieties and protect their interests. All in all in the South, there was a general feeling of joy over secession. Conflict had been gathering between the North and the South for some time, so secession was a break from the building animosity. Also, many southerners didn’t think that the North would fight for them to stay in the Union.[4] Secessionists felt that it was within their constitutional rights to opt out of the Union. As strong supporters of state sovereignty, many southerners saw the constitution as an agreement that any state could pull out of when and if they chose. Those who didn’t believe that secession was constitutional but still supported it claimed that it was their right to have a revolution.

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Works Cited

Egnal, Marc. “Rethinking the Secession of the Lower South: The Clash of Two Groups.” Civil War History 58, no. 3 (September 2004): 289.

McPherson, James. Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era. New York: Oxford
University Press, 1988.

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Endnotes

1 James McPherson, Battle Cry of Freedom: the Civil War Era (New York: Oxford University Press, 1988), 235.

2 Marc Egnal, “Rethinking the Secession of the Lower South: The Clash of Two Groups,” Civil War History 58, no. 3 (September 2004): 289.

3 James McPherson, Battle Cry of Freedom: the Civil War Era (New York: Oxford University Press, 1988), 239.

4 4 Ibid, 238.