It may be more useful to look at what Southerners had to say
about why they seceded.  It strikes me as useful to
distinguish between the motivations for individual soldiers
to fight in a war, on the one had, and the rationale of the
politcians who made the political decision to initiate a
war, on the other.  Soldiers fight for many reasons.  But
the political decision to provoke a constitutional crisis
that a great many feared would lead to war required explicit
justification.  The politicians had to explain their
decision to their constituents, in order to mobilize support
for it.  It seems likely to me that they meant what they
said--but even if they did not, they clearly were explaining
the decision to their constituents in terms designed to
maximize support for the decision.

Let's look at what Southern politicians had to say about why
secession was the right thing to do.  I will give three
examples, but they are just that, examples.  The general
thrust of these documents can be multiplied many times over;
there exist a multitude of similar documents.  Secession was
necessary, Southern politicians argued, in order to protect
slavery.

*****

First, here is the opening paragraph of Alexander
Stephen's "Cornerstone Speech," March 21, 1861:

"But not to be tedious in enumerating the numerous changes
for the better, allow me to allude to one other -- though
last, not least. The new constitution has put at rest,
forever, all the agitating questions relating to our
peculiar institution -- African slavery as it exists amongst
us -- the proper status of the negro in our form of
civilization. This was the immediate cause of the late
rupture and present revolution. Jefferson in his forecast,
had anticipated this, as the "rock upon which the old Union
would split." He was right. What was conjecture with him, is
now a realized fact. But whether he fully comprehended the
great truth upon which that rock stood and stands, may be
doubted. The prevailing ideas entertained by him and most of
the leading statesmen at the time of the formation of the
old constitution, were that the enslavement of the African
was in violation of the laws of nature; that it was wrong in
principle, socially, morally, and politically. It was an
evil they knew not well how to deal with, but the general
opinion of the men of that day was that, somehow or other in
the order of Providence, the institution would be evanescent
and pass away. This idea, though not incorporated in the
constitution, was the prevailing idea at that time. The
constitution, it is true, secured every essential guarantee
to the institution while it should last, and hence no
argument can be justly urged against the constitutional
guarantees thus secured, because of the common sentiment of
the day. Those ideas, however, were fundamentally wrong.
They rested upon the assumption of the equality of races.
This was an error. It was a sandy foundation, and the
government built upon it fell when the "storm came and the
wind blew."

*****

Second, here is the first clause of the Georgia secession
resolution, 19 Dec. 1860, explaining why secession is
legitimate and necessary:

"WHEREAS, A large portion of the people of the non-
slaveholding States, have for many years past, shown in many
ways, a fanatical spirit bitterly hostile to the Southern
States, and have, through the instrumentality of incendiary
publications, the pulpit, and the newspaper press, finally
organized a political party for the avowed purpose of
destroying the institution of slavery, and consequently
spreading ruin and desolation among the people in every
portion of the country where it exists . . ."

*****

Here are the key passages from the South
Carolina "Declaration of the Immediate Causes Which Induce
and Justify the Secession of South Carolina from the Federal
Union," 2 Feb. 1861.  This document begins with a
justification of the compact theory of the Constitution, and
then proceeds to the reasons why, in the view of the authors
of this document, the Northern States have failed to uphold
their obligations under the Constitution of the United
States of America:

"The Constitution of the United States, in its fourth
Article, provides as follows: "No person held to service or
labor in one State, under the laws thereof, escaping into
another, shall, in consequence of any law or regulation
therein, be discharged from such service or labor, but shall
be delivered up, on claim of the party to whom such service
or labor may be due."

"This stipulation was so material to the compact, that
without it that compact would not have been made. The
greater number of the contracting parties held slaves, and
they had previously evinced their estimate of the value of
such a stipulation by making it a condition in the Ordinance
for the government of the territory ceded by Virginia, which
now composes the States north of the Ohio River."

"The same article of the Constitution stipulates also for
rendition by the several States of fugitives from justice
from the other States."

"The General Government, as the common agent, passed laws to
carry into effect these stipulations of the States. For many
years these laws were executed. But an increasing hostility
on the part of the non-slaveholding States to the
institution of slavery, has led to a disregard of their
obligations, and the laws of the General Government have
ceased to effect the objects of the Constitution. The States
of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts,
Connecticut, Rhode Island, New York, Pennsylvania, Illinois,
Indiana, Michigan, Wisconsin and Iowa, have enacted laws
which either nullify the Acts of Congress or render useless
any attempt to execute them. In many of these States the
fugitive is discharged from service or labor claimed, and in
none of them has the State Government complied with the
stipulation made in the Constitution. The State of New
Jersey, at an early day, passed a law in conformity with her
constitutional obligation; but the current of anti-slavery
feeling has led her more recently to enact laws which render
inoperative the remedies provided by her own law and by the
laws of Congress. In the State of New York even the right of
transit for a slave has been denied by her tribunals; and
the States of Ohio and Iowa have refused to surrender to
justice fugitives charged with murder, and with inciting
servile insurrection in the State of Virginia. Thus the
constituted compact has been deliberately broken and
disregarded by the non-slaveholding States, and the
consequence follows that South Carolina is released from her
obligation."

Kevin R. Hardwick, Ph.D.
Department of History
James Madison University

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